KEY POINTS:
Fiji may pull out of the Pacific Forum leaders meeting in Niue next week after being excluded from subsequent meetings in New Zealand.
A Fiji news website, Fijilive, today reported the coup government's foreign minister Ratu Epeli Nailatikau as saying he was disappointed that Fiji was not able
to hold post-forum bilateral talks in Auckland.
But a New Zealand Government spokesman said there would be plenty of time for Fiji to hold bilateral talks on Niue in the six free hours available before flights off the island,
The website reported Fiji's five-member delegation had been told to hold all bilateral talks with the 16 Forum dialogue partners in Niue.
"This morning the prime minister's office backed the comments by Ratu Epeli, saying they shared similar sentiments," the website reported.
Independently, Radio New Zealand International reported the same comments being made on Fiji television.
Ratu Epeli said Fiji might have to rethink its position on attending the meeting if it continued to be singled out by Australia and New Zealand.
A spokesman for the Prime Minister's department in Wellington, said that bilateral meetings separate to the gathering at the Niue forum were not official Pacific Forum events.
"Fiji is, of course, free to arrange any meetings with forum partners throughout its time in Niue," the spokesman said.
It could arrange bilateral meetings on Niue, in Fiji or in the host country of forum dialogue partners: "It is as simple as that".
While the international post forum dialogue partners such as representatives of the United States, the European Union, China and Japan, were only on Niue for one day, the official events finished at 3.30pm on August 21 "allowing ample opportunity for discussions before the partners leave Niue at 9.40pm".
"There is therefore no basis to any suggestion that New Zealand is somehow preventing the participation of the Fiji interim government delegation in either the forum or the post-forum dialogue," the spokesman said.
"New Zealand has, by granting specific exemptions to its travel ban to enable transit through Auckland, ensured the opportunity for the interim government to front up to leaders in Niue".
Talks in Niue begin on August 19 and leaders are expected to fly out of Auckland early next week for the two-day meeting.
Prime Minster Helen Clark will meet Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in Auckland on Monday, immediately ahead of the leaders flying to Niue.
Foreign Affairs officials said transit visas for Cdre Bainimarama and several of his senior ministers were approved because Pacific Islands leaders wanted to hear his explanation for backing away from a promise to hold elections in Fiji by March 2009.
Commodore Frank Bainimarama and members of his regime have been banned from entering New Zealand since the December 2006 coup.
- NZPA
