George Tupou V of Tonga for the purposes of assuring that political independence and neutrality were retained. On 24 February 2012, he visited pope Benedict XVI in Vatican City. During his reign, George Tupou V oversaw reforms within the Tongan honours system which both expanded the number of Orders in the Kingdom and created rules to make the award of these Orders more egalitarian. In September 2011, Tupou V had surgery to remove a kidney following the discovery of a tumour. On 15 September 2011 he received the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary from Pál Schmitt,
Taliai Tupou have induced him to finally and publicly accept the Christian faith in 1849. From this point forward Christianity gradually replaced the old religion and gained hold in Lau and the rest of Fiji. David Cargill describes Taliai Tupou in his journals as a “however reluctant, tributary monarch”. As he did not have the reserves of manpower like the Tui Cakau or Vunivalu of Bau he could never risk confrontation with his adversaries and the alternative was to maintain friendly relations over as wide a field as possible. In this sense he can he stated as an astute diplomat, having somewhat