Solomon Islands prime minster Manaseh Sogavare has sought to clarify a comment he made on an Australian podcast that Taiwan is completely useless.

RNZ
Date: Sep 15, 2019

The Little Red Podcast, made my academics at the Australian National University, was examining the

Solomons' pending decision on whether to switch diplomatic relations from Taiwan to China.

"To be honest when it comes to economics and politics Taiwan is completely useless to us," he said.

However, Mr Sogavare said the comment was taken out of context, being the imbalance between the amount of development assistance provided by Taiwan and the dollar value of Tuna caught by Taiwan in Solomon Islands' waters.

He said he was led to believe his conversation with the academic was confidential and not an interview.    [FULL  STORY]