China’s Premier Li is visiting New Zealand, where security fears vie with trade hopes on the agenda

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — China’s Premier Li Qiang arrived in New Zealand on Thursday, beginning a rare visit to its closest partner among Western democracies, where a celebration of trade links is expected to vie with concerns about South Pacific security on Wellington’s agenda.

China’s No. 2 official, Li is the first Chinese premier to visit New Zealand since a 2017 visit by Li Keqiang. He will also visit Australia and Malaysia, China’s Foreign Ministry said this week. The trip coincides with easing tensions between Australia and China that have vexed the relationship in recent years.

New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon is expected to salute trade links with China in public statements this week. China is the South Pacific nation’s largest trading partner, with two-way trade worth 36 billion New Zealand dollars ($22 billion). They signed a bilateral free trade agreement in 2008 — China’s first with an Organization for Cooperation and Development nation — and the visit marks the 10th anniversary of a pledge to bolster ties signed in 2014 when China’s President Xi Jinping last visited Wellington.

But while Luxon hailed the visit in remarks to reporters on Monday as presenting renewed opportunities for business, Wellington has long sought to diversify the country’s export market away from dependence on China and the visit will not be a simple story of economic success as engagements with New Zealand leaders have sometimes been before.

As China and the U.S. vie for influence in the Pacific, Luxon spoke ahead of a tour of Niue and Fiji this month of “increasingly choppy geostrategic waters” for the region, although he stopped short of naming China except as one of a list of countries jockeying for sway.

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