This is CBS Eye on the World.

Here's John Batchelor.

This is CBSI on the world.

I'm John Batchel, joined by my good colleague Cleo Pascal of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy.

We apply ourselves routinely to the vast

Oceania, the Indo-Pacific, and the contest between the People's Republic of China, the United

States, Australia, and other good actors to keep the Chinese from overwhelming the people

who live there with inducements, sometimes called bribes,

and with violence and threats of violence.

We're going now to the Solomon Islands.

That is Guadalcanal to American lore, but it's a series of islands.

Guadalcanal is one of them.

One of the islands is Malata.

And in the spring of 2023, Cleo Pascal, traveling with a man named Daniel Suadani,

representing Milita to Washington, introduced me to Daniel, and we interview it online. That program is

available on my podcast. I learned from Cleo at that moment and here-to-fore meeting Daniel Suadani that he represented

people in his district, Maleta, who did not want Chinese domination, who pushed back

against it, and Daniel Suadani had been the premier of the legislature on Maleta.

It's a federal system.

There's one capital, but there are islands that have their own governance. He had been threatened and dislodged by sympathetic Chinese actors because he was resisting. This resistance started

somewhat earlier when he needed medical attention and

traveled to Taipei, Taiwan. That was his sin. He traveled to Taipei. And China then declared him

...