Foreign minister to blitz key Pacific island states

Foreign Minister Penny Wong will blitz three key Pacific island nations in her first standalone trip after Labor's landslide re-election.

The foreign minister will visit Vanuatu, Tonga and Fiji across three days in the region, visiting new prime ministers in Port Vila and Nuku'alofa, along with the region's centre of diplomacy.

Senator Wong will be joined by Assistant Foreign Affairs Minister Matt Thistlethwaite in what will be his first official overseas trip.

Near the top of Senator Wong's agenda will be COP31, the UN climate change conference it is hoping to co-host with the region next year.

Turkey is also contending for hosting rights of the 2026 talks.

While Australia would hold the summit, with Adelaide proposed as the host city, Vanuatu climate minister Ralph Regenvanu reminded his counterparts in Canberra the Pacific had high expectations of climate progress.

"We would expect equal say in what happens at the COP and what the outcomes will be," he said.

"We expect the Albanese government to stop approving new oil and gas projects.

"We expect and we want to see an outcome of COP31 being financing of a just transition across the Pacific so that we become the first region in the world to become completely renewable in our identification."

Mr Regenvanu said his views were felt across the Pacific, citing Palau's President Surangel Whipps Jr's statements while in Sydney last month as evidence.

In a keynote address to the Lowy Institute, Mr Whipps Jr lashed Australia's fossil fuel exports, which he said was responsible for 4.5 per cent of global emissions.

He also called for Australia to phase out coal and gas production and halt the approval of new fossil fuel projects "as the Pacific region faces the dire consequences of the climate crisis".

The whole region would be making a similar request "so that we can advance our stated indices towards the fossil fuel-free Pacific by 2050", Mr Regenvanu said.

Alongside climate talks, Senator Wong is likely to revisit a bilateral security agreement agreed between Australia and Vanuatu that remains unratified in Port Vila.

Australia agreed to that deal during a barnstorming start to Senator Wong's tenure, when the South Australian visited all 17 other Pacific Islands Forum members within 12 months of becoming foreign minister in 2022.

Since that pact, Vanuatu has changed prime minister twice, with Jotham Napat's government disinclined to ratify the agreement until it is modified.

Senator Wong will meet with Mr Napat and his senior ministers while in Port Vila.

"We will reaffirm Australia's commitment to elevate our bilateral relationship through the development of the Nakamal Agreement with Vanuatu," Senator Wong said in a pre-departure statement.

She will also meet with Tonga's prime minister 'Aisake Eke, who took the office in January, and also assumed position of the Pacific Islands Forum chair, as well as Foreign Affairs Minister Tupouto'a 'Ulukalala.

In Suva, she will hold talks with Sitiveni Rabuka, the veteran Fijian prime minister.