New Zealand is resetting its foreign policy and looking to engage more in security and defense areas in the Indo-Pacific, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said in an interview on Wednesday.
“It’s a reset to focus on the Indo-Pacific region because we think that is the region that we have a lot of national interests in,” Luxon told Nikkei Asia in Tokyo. Luxon’s three-day visit is his first trip to Japan as prime minister, during which he has met his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida.
Luxon explained that the shift was in the “national interest,” as New Zealand wants to double exports and regional stability is necessary for it to realize this ambition.
Apart from business, regional security in itself is an important aim, he stressed. “We also need to be engaged and participate in the security and defense issues that exist across the region,” said Luxon, who is leader of the National Party.
New Zealand is a member of the U.S.-led Five Eyes intelligence-sharing group, which also includes Australia, Canada and the U.K. But its government has often been thought to be cautious about taking a stance in geopolitical affairs, particularly those involving China, which absorbs 22% of New Zealand’s goods and services.
Of late, Wellington has become more vocal about its regional concerns. Last year, the former Labor government published the nation’s first national security strategy. It described China as turning “more assertive and more willing to challenge existing international rules and norms.”
“We have an independent foreign policy that comprises our security and our economic interests. But both of those things are increasingly linked,” Luxon said.
