ASPI’s cursory review found 40 regional security initiatives, many of them involving Australia — a number that underlines both the density of existing cooperation and the gaps that still leave the Indo‑Pacific exposed to multidimensional coercion.
ASPI’s review: quantity without cross-domain reach
The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) identified roughly 40 initiatives aimed at regional security. According to the review cited by the EU, most of these efforts are concentrated either geographically — around forums such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Pacific Islands Forum — or thematically and functionally, narrow in scope. Many are dedicated to single domains such as maritime security, cyber, or information security, or limited to functions like intelligence fusion, knowledge production or delivering technological solutions. The problem, as ASPI and the EU frame it, is hybrid threats do not respect these institutional silos; they are transnational, multidimensional and persistent, and therefore require coordinated, cross-domain responses.
EU instruments since 2025: partnerships and multi‑million‑euro programmes
Since 2025 the EU has signed Security and Defence Partnership agreements with South Korea, Japan, India and Australia. The EU is also funding multi‑year, multi‑million‑euro initiatives intended to strengthen on‑the‑ground capabilities in the Indo‑Pacific. These programmes include Enhancing Security Cooperation In and With Asia (ESIWA), focused on technical assistance on specific security issues; Critical Maritime Routes Indo‑Pacific (CRIMARIO), which aims to facilitate information‑sharing around maritime security; and the Global Gateway Initiative, focused on physical infrastructure investments. The EU’s posture, as presented in this analysis, treats economic and security ties to the Indo‑Pacific as entangled and sees capability‑building and information‑sharing as mutually reinforcing.
Australia’s operational precedent: the 2018 countering foreign interference ministerial
Australia established the countering foreign interference ministerial in 2018. It began with ministers from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Britain and the United States and later expanded to include a larger group of trusted partners from Asia and Europe. The ministerial provides a model for inter‑governmental discussion: partners share threat assessments, response mechanisms and prevention tools related to malign interference by foreign states. This existing Australian‑led network is cited as proof that inter‑regional cooperation is possible and in demand.
What the proposed EU–Australia pilot framework would do
The EU has engaged ASPI to analyse the feasibility of establishing an overarching inter‑regional framework to connect European and Indo‑Pacific partners on hybrid threats. The envisioned platform would be light‑footprint, experience‑sharing and coordination‑oriented, combining evidence‑building, networks and expertise. In its initial phase the pilot could concentrate on select priority domains: cyber and digital threats, foreign information manipulation and interference, and critical infrastructure resilience. It would facilitate consultations, provide evidence‑based assessments of emerging trends, and offer access to technical assistance, tools and capability‑building platforms, anchored around coalitions of willing and able partners.
What this means for Singapore, Taiwan and Fiji
- Singapore and Taiwan: Named by the source as “capable partners,” both are explicitly identified as actors who need to be part of an inter‑regional equation. For them, participation promises access to pooled intelligence, shared assessments and technical assistance tailored to fast‑moving hybrid threats.
- Fiji (and similar Pacific island states): The source highlights smaller developing nations such as Fiji and Vanuatu as especially vulnerable and therefore priority targets for coercion. For these states, the proposed framework would aim to provide resilience through capability‑building and support that can reduce single‑point vulnerabilities.
The EU’s resources and convening power, combined with Australia’s operational experience and wide network of bilateral ties in Europe and the Indo‑Pacific, are presented as complementary assets. The pilot’s real test will be whether this connective idea can convert a growing web of parallel bilateral relationships into a cohesive, cross‑regional architecture capable of delivering instant intelligence, coordinated responses and practical resilience.
If the pilot succeeds, the authors argue, it could change the calculus of coercive actors. If it fails to move beyond a voluntary, light‑touch forum it will risk leaving the most vulnerable states exposed and the most consequential domains — cyber, information and critical infrastructure — insufficiently synchronized. The central unresolved question: will a pilot framework become the durable connective tissue that regional resilience against hybrid threats now requires?
