Palau delegation held talks with SIS member countries prior to Pacific Islands Forum Conference

By Francis Talasasa

A six member delegation of Palau attending the 47^th annual Pacific Islands Forum conference, held its first full day meeting with other Small Island State (SIS) countries on Wednesday 7, a day before the official opening of the Pacific Islands Forum Conference in the Federated States of Micronesia’s capital, Pohnpei.

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The delegation was headed by the State Minister Billy Kuartei together with a Pohnpei based Palau Counsel General to FSM, Anastacia Remeliik- Isaac, Foreign affairs and Trade Director, Gustav Aitaro, Chief of Foreign Affairs Jeraldin E. Tudong, Foreign Service Officer, Lila Anne U. Demei, and PMC Chairman Moses Uludong.

The SIS meeting was held to talk about national interests with member countries, outlining of 3 issues such as the Membership and admission of FSM to SIS, Leaders request to council of regional organizations of pacific (CROP) urgencies to implement strategy and endorsement of SIS attachment program.

The endorsement of SIS attachment program was a success after Palau pushed hard for its proposal during a special SIS meeting held in June this year. The recent meeting has fully supported and endorsed and will be launched soon.

Small Island State (SIS) is a sub-group of the 16 member Pacific Island Forum (PIF) member countries composed of 8 smallest states in the Pacific Island including Palau, Cook Islands, Tuvalu, Marshall Islands, Kiribati, Nauru, Niue and Federated States of Micronesia which was admitted to SIS membership on Wednesday 7.

The 8 other larger Island countries together form up the PIF and non-member states of the SIS are Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Australia, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Vanuatu and New Zealand. [/restrict]