South Pacific nations have backed plans to send an Australian-led intervention force into the lawless and near-bankrupt Solomon Islands.
"Ministers endorsed the provision of a package of strengthened assistance to Solomon Islands including a policing operation to restore law and order, supported, as required, by armed peacekeepers," the 16-nation Pacific Islands Forum said in a statement after a meeting in Sydney.
Australia and New Zealand are contemplating sending a 2,000-strong multinational force of police, troops and support crew to take over policing and parts of government in the Solomons, where hundreds have been killed in ethnic violence.
It would be the largest military deployment in the region since World War Two.
