Aristyo Rizka Darmawan is Lecturer in international law at the Universitas Indonesia and a former Visiting Fellow with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University. Currently he is a PhD Scholar at the School of Regulation and Global Governance at the Australian National University. His research focuses on the intersection between international law of the sea and maritime security in the Asia Pacific.
Though Indonesia is not overly concerned about the new US–PNG Defense Cooperation Agreement, it wants to avoid stoking the US-China fire in the Indo-Pacific.