BY JOHN HOUANIHAU

Climate change was among Prime Minister (PM) Jeremiah Manele’s discussions during the Australia Solomon Islands 14th Business Forum from November 17 to 19, 2025 in Brisbane, Australia.

Speaking to local media during his Press conference on Nov 28, 2025, PM Manele said that the discussion on climate change was mainly on exchanging updates on Australia’s bid for the Conference of the Parties (COP31).

“During my visit or trip to Brisbane for the Australia Solomon Islands 14th Business Forum, I took the opportunity to have a couple of bilateral meetings with Australia. On climate change, the discussion was mainly on exchanging updates on Australia’s bid for COP 31,” he said.

PM Manele said that Australia and the Pacific are to host the COP31 in the Pacific.

“Our work on COP 31 is that we would like it to be a Pacific COP. But also, during that time, when we were there, a decision was taken that Turkey would host COP 31,” he said.

He, however told the media that Australia and the Pacific will host a pre-COP leaders’ meeting somewhere in the Pacific.

“And I think this is important. Of course, our thought in the Pacific is, it would have been good if we were the host of COP 31. And we were trying to achieve that outcome.

“But through the negotiations, somehow, we were not able to achieve that. But still, we have something. We achieved something in terms of a pre-leaders’ COP, before the actual COP and the fact that Australia is being selected or appointed as president of the COP 31 negotiations,” he said.

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