Guest essay by Eric Worrall

Former Aussie Socialist Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has once again demonstrated his masterful diplomatic skills, by offering independent Pacific Islanders colonial status, to protect future generations from climate change and rising seas.

Tuvalu PM slams Kevin Rudd’s proposal to offer Australian citizenship for Pacific resources as neo-colonialism

Pacific Mornings By Anthony Stewart

A proposal from Kevin Rudd to address the impacts of climate change on the Pacific has been labelled as “imperial thinking” by Tuvalu’s leader, who lambasted the former prime minister’s suggestion to swap Australian citizenship for maritime resources.

Key points:

Kevin Rudd’s proposed arrangement would require the Pacific countries to give up their sovereignty

It would also require a rewriting of their constitutions, as well as Australia’s constitution

Tuvalu’s Prime Minister says his country “will not be subjugated” under a “colonial mentor”

Mr Rudd wrote in a recent essay that Australia should offer citizenship to residents of the small Pacific nations of Tuvalu, Kiribati and Nauru in exchange for control of their seas, Exclusive Economic Zones, and fisheries.

“Under this arrangement, Australia would also become responsible for the relocation over time of the exposed populations of these countries [totalling less than 75,000 people altogether] to Australia where they would enjoy the full rights of Australian citizens,” Mr Rudd wrote.

But the idea — which in essence would see the countries give up their sovereignty — has been strongly criticised by Tuvalu’s Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga, who warned it amounts to a form of neo-colonialism.

“The days of that type of imperial thinking are over,” Mr Sopoaga told the ABC.

“We are a fully independent country, and there is no way I’m going to compromise our rights to fisheries resources, our rights to our immediate resources.”

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Mr Rudd’s key proposal is to relocate citizens of Pacific Island nations to Australia once rising sea levels make these nations uninhabitable, pointing out that their populations combined is less than half of Australia’s total annual immigration intake.

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