Prime Minister Fiame thank you so much for the incredibly warm welcome to Samoa
It is an incredible honor and pleasure to be here in the first month of Samoa’s international borders
opening again after more than two years of the COVID-19 pandemic.
I want to congratulate you madam Prime Minister for Samoa’s capable management of the pandemic.
The United States is proud to work with Samoa to share more than 45,000 doses of safe, effective, and
lifesaving COVID-19 vaccines with the Samoan people in partnership with COVAX.
I am thrilled to start my trip to the region here in Samoa which is the United States Pacific Island
neighbor, our strong partner, and our good friend. Our two countries share a commitment to important
democratic values including respect for human rights, a commitment to protecting freedom of
expression, and freedom of religion or belief and a strong belief in the importance of a free and open
Press.
The Prime Minister and I just had a very productive discussion about the partnership between the
United States and Samoa. I reiterated the United States support for a strong and united Pacific Islands
Forum and expressed our gratitude for the PIF’s generous invitation to Vice President Harris to virtually
address the Forum last month.
Indeed the President of the United States is looking forward to welcoming Pacific Island leaders to the
White House in September around the UN General Assembly, we hope to announce a date very soon.
We talked about our continuing work together to address the COVID-19 pandemic and to combat the
climate crisis which poses a profound threat to people everywhere and especially in the Pacific Islands.
We discussed the partnership between Samoa and the U.S. Coast Guard, to conduct security patrols of
Samoa’s EEZ as part of our collective effort to combat illegal unregulated and unreported fishing which
damages the ocean environment and undermines Samoa’s economy.
We discussed how the new partners in the Blue Pacific initiative which was recently launched by the
United States, Australia, Japan, and New Zealand, and the United Kingdom will help us better coordinate
our work with Pacific island partners on the challenges we all face from climate change to economic
development, to maintaining a free and open Indo-Pacific.
We talked about the importance of education, and we are so glad for the success of the first in person
young pacific leader’s conference in two years which took place in July and included Samoan
representatives. The young Pacific leaders programme builds connections between the next generations
of leaders in the United States, the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, and Australia because we all know the
best way to solve the challenges we face and build a better future for the region and the world is by
working together and educating our young people.
I told the Prime Minister that the United States looks forward to soon returning Peace Corps volunteers
to Samoa. The office has been open but because of the pandemic we have not had the volunteers. Over
the last 55 years more than 2,000 Peace Corps volunteers have served in Samoa, an incredible symbol of
the partnership and friendship between our people.

Above all, I am here in Samoa and in the region to listen to and learn from our Pacific sisters and
brothers. We are one Pacific family bound together by our history our values, our culture and our shared
priorities, and there is no limit to what we can achieve when we come together as partners.
Thank you again madam Prime Minister for welcoming me and my delegation so warmly. I look forward
to our continued friendship.

Statement by the Prime Minister of Samoa, Hon. Fiame Naomi Mataafa – (05 August 2022)
Talofa and good morning to our Press Corps
I would like to formally at this conference again welcome her Excellency Deputy Secretary Wendy
Sherman; the most senior representative of the US Administration to visit us and especially since our
Administration and the current Government has taken office.
We are very pleased to receive your visit Deputy Secretary. I think it is always an advantage for parties
to meet face-to-face and the COVID context has prevented us from doing this.
I won’t canvass the scope of issues raised and I think the Deputy Secretary has covered that very well,
but I think because of we are moving into post COVID I cannot let the opportunity go without publicly
expressing our appreciation and thankfulness to the Government of the United States for their
assistance through COVID and directly bilaterally to our COVID response, and I’ve informed the Deputy
Secretary that our rates now for vaccinations are in the 90 to 93 percent and that has been able to offer
us coverage and security, herd immunity and leading Government to make the decision to open our
borders on the 1 st of August. It’s very good that we are able to welcome you very early on in the opening
of our borders, and we hope to also have other opportunities to host representatives of your
Government and I understand that the Ambassador in Wellington will be visiting us next year.
The other key point that I had indicated appreciation to Deputy Secretary is the shift in policy of the
United States with respect to climate change and the return of the US to the climate discourse, the Paris
Agreement. The US is a significant partner and we are very pleased to see their return to the climate
discourse.
We have also indicated our appreciation of Ambassador Kerry’s leadership with the oceans work and
more recently the Pacific hosted the Ocean’s Conference in Palau, and we look forward to furthering
that work and especially the nexus between climate change and oceans which are issues that are very
pertinent to our Blue Pacific Continent.
With the loss of our patrol boat we have been very appreciative of the regional collaboration and with
our development partners including the U.S. through their Coast Guard and other Naval Vessels on the
security and surveillance within the region and the protections of our economic zones.
The Peace Corps, COVID has not permitted the volunteers coming in but the presence of Peace Corps
remains in Samoa with their office and the leadership in the Administration and we do look forward to a
return of normality. The Peace Corps has been a constant US flagship, the programme has contributed

significantly to many sectors but especially the education sector here in Samoa and we look forward to
continuing that work with the Peace Corps.
We are very pleased, and Deputy Secretary has very kindly indicated that she is here to learn and to
listen, but it is also an opportunity for us here in Samoa and for myself as the leader to have firsthand
discourse with this level of representation from the United States Government.
When I was in Fiji last month, the Vice President announced decisions not only with regards to the Tuna
Treaty, to the amount of $60,000,000 dollars per year for the next treaty period but also the Vice
President laid out the general frameworks of how the US would like to work with us in the Pacific and
we are very happy to begin to explore the opportunities that we have there, and mutual benefits I hope
for all of us.
Deputy Secretary let me just say that we are very mindful that you have quite a programme ahead of
you, very envious of the fact that these large countries have airplanes and can cover three or four
countries in a day, and we wish you safe travels.
We do look forward and we are very happy to take note of the indication that your President would like
to meet with the pacific leaders later in the year and we look forward to that opportunity.
Safe travels