Jacinda Ardern has called for a de-escalation of the tensions between China and the US and its allies in the Indo-Pacific, warning that the region risked embracing a “self-fulfilling prophesy” and sparking a conflict. The New Zealand prime minister said that there was a danger that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had reduced the complexity of geopolitics to a “black and white” view that pitched autocracies against democracies and could alienate China. Ardern stressed that Beijing had a “crucial role to play” in upholding the world order.

“In the wake of the tensions we see rising, including in our Indo-Pacific region, diplomacy must become the strongest tool and de-escalation the loudest call,” she told the Lowy Institute think-tank in Sydney on Thursday.

“We won’t succeed, however, if those parties we seek to engage with are increasingly isolated and the region we inhabit becomes increasingly divided and polarised. We must not allow the risk of a self-fulfilling prophecy to become an inevitable outcome for our region.”