Beijing Warns New Zealand to ‘Think Twice’ Before Joining AUKUS

New Zealand should “think twice” before progressing with its plans to join the AUKUS alliance, Beijing has warned. The defence and foreign ministers of Australia and New Zealand met on Feb. 1, after which Australia’s Defence Minister Richard Marles announced that a delegation would travel to New Zealand “very shortly” to discuss Pillar II of the AUKUS pact—the security partnership between Australia, the UK, and United States. The alliance is widely seen—including by Beijiing—as a response to the Chinese Communist Party’s growing influence in the Pacific. A key part of AUKUS is the arming of the Royal Australian Navy with nuclear-powered submarines from its two partners, at a cost of up to $368 billion by the mid-2050s....