Pledge for mutual defense as ‘warfare’ moves to cyberspace

A large-scale cyberattack on Australia or New Zealand would trigger a mutual defence pact, leaders say, as trans-Tasman partners work to improve security.

Such an incident “could constitute an armed attack” within the meaning of the ANZUS treaty, the prime ministers of Australia and New Zealand have determined.

“The way we look at warfare is changing. An attack on the economy can undermine the functioning of an entire society,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters in Canberra after meeting his Kiwi counterpart on Friday.

New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Luxon, speaking alongside Albanese, said the alliance would come into effect after “a sufficiently serious cyberattack”.

“Modern warfare has moved into cyberspace,” he said.

“It is important that we have arranged that.”

Australia is committed to improving cybersecurity across the Pacific region, recently investing $16.7 million to upgrade hardware and software to better protect against online threats.

The head of the Oceania region at Swift, the technology that supports financial transactions between 20 Pacific island nations, said the company was working to strengthen cybersecurity in the sector and tackle transnational crime.

“Attacks happen all the time, we cannot avoid it but we are working to protect ourselves,” Suresh Rajalingam told AAP.

In addition to banks, the company also works with the Australian central bank and financial regulator APRA, as well as government agencies in New Zealand and the Pacific, he said.

Pacific security was also discussed by the two prime ministers at the annual Leaders’ Dialogue. A policing initiative will be submitted to the Pacific Islands Forum for approval in late August.

The forum’s foreign ministers supported the proposal at a meeting on August 9, but Solomon Islands expressed concern that the proposal was being pushed through.

The Solomon Islands signed a security pact with China, to which Australians responded by saying Beijing had no role in policing the region.

Without specifically addressing the Solomons’ concerns, Albanese said the police initiative is in line with the view of Pacific nations that “the security of our region is primarily the responsibility of our family.”

A joint communiqué noted that “Pacific countries had the will and capacity to address shared security concerns from within the region itself”.

Mr Luxon indicated that he supported the police pact, pointing to transnational organised crime and drug trafficking as relevant issues.

“Within the Pacific I think it would be well received,” he said.

Despite the warm handshakes of the leaders, the criminal deportations continued to cause tensions.

The issue has become a political minefield in Australia after the conservative opposition seized on a ministerial directive allowing courts to assess a criminal’s ties to the nation before deporting him or her.

A number of deportees who had been granted the right to remain in Australia committed heinous crimes and caused the concession to be revoked.

Mr Luxon said he respected Australian laws but had to focus on a healthy approach to people who spent almost all of their childhoods in Australia.

“Prime Minister Albanese and I have agreed to work closely together on this,” he said.

Mr Albanese said community safety was Australia’s “primary consideration” but reiterated it was a common sense approach.

Australia will work with the New Zealand Defence Force to streamline cooperation and provide input where necessary into Wellington’s review of its military following a similar defence review in Canberra.

“We want to be fully interoperable with the Australian Armed Forces, we want to be a force multiplier for Australia,” Luxon said.

He was ceremonially welcomed into the Parliament building, after which he signed the official guest book.

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