Murray McCully

Wellington, Feb 4 NZPA - Talks between Fiji, New Zealand and Australia yesterday focussed on finding a way to keep diplomatic missions running in each country without being disrupted by every spat that broke out between the nations.

Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully, his Australian counterpart Stephen Smith and Fiji's Foreign Minister Kubuabola met in Canberra yesterday.

Relations between New Zealand and Fiji have been fraught since the 2006 coup in Fiji and further deteriorated last year with the tit-for-tat expulsion of senior diplomats, which followed interim Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe (Frank) Bainimarama's repeated rejection of international deadlines for elections and measures against the media.

Efforts to re-staff high commissions hit another hurdle when Fiji provocatively put up Permanent Secretary for Information and military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Neumi Leweni for the position of counsellor. New Zealand has a travel ban on members of the military-led regime and Lt Col Leweni played a central role in the coup, was responsible for censoring local media, deporting journalists and curbing free speech, all moves that have met with criticism from the Australian and New Zealand governments.

Mr McCully said the Leweni proposal was raised during yesterday's talks but he declined to comment further as the focus was on finding a way to fully staff high commissions.

"We've had a good discussion yesterday," Mr McCully told Radio New Zealand.

"We've agreed that we will talk again, we've agreed that we've got a responsibility to try and work through a process which will result in our missions being able to operate regardless of disagreements that we might have and we are still talking."

New Zealand and Fiji both had capacity problems at their missions.

Australia was in a slightly better position but Mr McCully revealed that he insisted any talks included the trans-Tasman neighbour.

Talks ranged into other areas.

"Of course they spill over into wider matters of disagreement between us but the focus is on dealing with the ability to operate our machinery and therefore to communicate effectively. We are not going to find solutions to the harder problems if we don't have the machinery to communicate, for dialogue."

Mr McCully said removing the travel ban was not on New Zealand's immediate agenda.

"We've got to make a number of short steps forward rather than having one big leap here."

Mr McCully said media comment the Fijian minister did not have authority were "uncharitable".

Mr Smith told AFP that the lack of diplomatic staff made it difficult to get progress.

"We don't want Fiji to be isolationist, and we've always held ourselves out as willing to have a dialogue," he said.

"But what is the significance or importance of the day's meeting is the actual having of the dialogue," he said.

"It may well be that all we agree as a result of the day's meeting is to speak again in the future. Frankly, I'd regard that myself as progress."

Fiji was suspended from the 16-nation Pacific Islands Forum in May last year and from the Commonwealth in September over Cdre Bainimarama's broken promises to hold elections by March 2009.