Pacific leaders issue joint rebuke over Chinese missile test

KOROR, Palau — Pacific Island nations condemned a Chinese missile test into their midst in a joint statement agreed on Thursday, despite pressure from Beijing on Palau, the host of a regional leaders’ meeting. The Pacific Islands Forum summit communique, read by Palau’s President Surangel Whipps to a late-night news conference, calls for at least 24 hours’ notice of any intercontinental ballistic missile testing. The statement was agreed by 17 of 18 forum members, with Naoero, formerly known as Nauru, dissenting. China gave only a handful of nations short notice before test-firing the intercontinental ballistic missile in July, flexing its…