AUSTRALIA has pledged millions of dollars to support Pacific island nations deal with the climate emergency.

The new Labour administration also pledged on Friday to provide additional funds for Australia’s police deployment in the Solomon Islands, for regional aerial surveillance and an Australian Border Force network.

Foreign minister Penny Wong is promising to increase the budget for overseas development assistance by 1.4 billion Australian dollars over the next four years, with 900 million of that sum going to the Pacific region.

A further 30 million Australian dollars will go towards boosting aerial surveillance in the region with another 19 million going towards setting up a network of Australian Border Force officers across the region.

Speaking at the Pacific Way Conference in French Polynesia, Ms Wong said: “The additional assistance will directly support action in the region to strengthen climate resilience, including on climate science and renewable energy.”

Ms Wong said the assistance was a way of supporting regional partners to “provide their own security so they have less need to call on others.

“Without these investments others will continue to fill the vacuum.”

Australia, its neighbour New Zealand, and the US have all expressed concern about the growing influence of China in the Pacific islands region.

China struck a security agreement with the Solomon Islands in April of this year.

A few weeks ago the Solomon Islands sent almost three-dozen police officers to China for training, in a sign of the deepening relationship between the two nations.

This has raised alarm bells with the US in particular, which for decades has seen the region as falling within another one of its spheres of influence.

During an official visit to Canberra earlier this month, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare said foreign military bases would never be allowed in his country and said his nation would not undermine security in the region.

Earlier this week Australia signed an agreement with Fiji to allow the operation of their respective militaries in each other’s country.

But Ms Wong acknowledged at the conference that climate change was “the single greatest threat” to lives, livelihoods and security in the region. 

Ms Wong said: “You have called on us to act. We have heard you. And we have responded.”

The Solomon Islands is one of the most vulnerable nations to climate change, with the majority of the population living within 1.5 kilometres from the coastline.