Palau President Tommy Remengesau Jnr has thanked Mr Trump for signing an extension to the Palau compact last week.

The agreement promises a total of $US229million US dollars in funding for Palau through to 2024. Mr Trump called on Congress to make $US124 million of that available in the 2018 fiscal year.

President Remengesau said Mr Trump’s action after seven years of delay sends a clear message to the people of the Pacific that the US stands again with its friends.

It is clear Mr Trump’s action is in recognition of Palau’s importance to the United States in two key areas: maintenance of its presence and influence in the Pacific region where China is agressively forging ahead with its global ambitions; and strengthening its national security strategy against a possible North Korea attack.

On these two fronts, Palau is key to the US. A strategic defense base against the rogue republic. But more importantly, Palau guarantees US access and influence in a region that is increasingly contested by China.

However, credit for getting the agreement over the line really goes to U.S. Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan.

He is the individual who’s been working for several years to get the fifteen-year extension enacted into law. A desired outcome pursued with commitment because he felt it was important not just for Palau, but for the whole Western Pacific region.

“From Palau’s point of view — and to other nations in the Pacific region — it seemed as though America was not good for its word. America could not be trusted,” reported the Mariana Variety last week.

“That is no way for our nation to maintain influence in what is becoming every day a more strategically important — and contested — area of the world,” Congressman Sablan said. “But today we showed America is committed to the Pacific.”

The approach Congressman Sablan used was to leverage Palau’s point of difference to the US. It meant lobbying to include the Palau Compact into the annual US Defence bill. So when President Trump signed into law the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act last week, the Palau agreement finally got the formal approval it craved since negotiations began in 2010.

“Focusing on Compact approval as a matter of strategic importance to the United States was key, I think, to getting it through Congress and signed into law today.

“Although Congress has appropriated the funding amounts negotiated with Palau year-after-year, we were not giving Palau the assurance of long-term commitment that approval of the Compact provides.”

Congress must now approve a budget to fund the Compact’s implementation.

The agreement promises a total of $US229 million US dollars in funding for Palau through 2024, and Mr Trump has called on Congress to make $US 124 million of that available in the 2018 fiscal year.

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Sablan had introduced legislation approving the Compact and authorizing multi-year funding. He arranged hearings for his bill before House Foreign Affairs and Natural Resources subcommittees. Then, working with Congresswomen Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, and Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, he was able to win the support of the Defense Department for inclusion of the Compact approval in the 2017 Defense bill.

Although the 2016 effort was not successful, Sablan again introduced Compact legislation in 2017, again got a hearing on the bill, and won approval in the House Natural Resources Committee, which is chaired by Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah. Bishop is also a member of the House Armed Services Committee, which writes the annual Defense authorization.

Congress must now approve a budget to fund the Compact’s implementation.

The agreement promises a total of $US 229 million US dollars in funding for Palau through 2024, and Mr Trump has called on Congress to make $US 124 million of that available in the 2018 fiscal year.