Hollow commitments to action in the future are insufficient. Deferring difficult issues must not be tolerated. Our children and grandchildren expect us to speak and act decisively.

It is important to remember that the Pacific Ocean covers a quarter of the world's surface and that each Pacific country has its own cultural, historical and ethnic identity.

By and large, women in New Zealand are fortunate compared with some other countries, including many in our own region. But there is still progress to be made.

The serious problems facing the world today will never be solved until women are able to use their full potential on behalf of themselves, their families, and their global and local communities, as the World Bank and others have discovered

Hollow commitments to action in the future are insufficient. Deferring difficult issues must not be tolerated. Our children and grandchildren expect us to speak and act decisively.

Too often the desire for peace has been expressed by women while the stewardship of the mechanisms which are used to attempt to secure peace in the short and medium term are dominated by male decision-making structures and informal arrangements. This must change.

The Open Skies issue is something that's ongoing and we understand that there are issues in Australia that need to be sorted out. It's something that I think over time there's an opportunity for us and we'll work on that in a progressive way.