Mr Chan Talks To The Nauruans

Nauru celebrated its seventh year of independence at the beginning of February. Attending the celebrations as representative of Papua New Guinea's Chief Minister, Mr Michael Somare, Finance Minister Mr Julius Chan emphasised the value of close relationships between South Pacific countries.

“We share many common attitudes to life and many common prob lems”, he said. “Our people live in small and relatively isolated communities and share the problems of transport and communications that result from this.

“As relatively small countries, we share the problems that arise from economic developments in a world too big for us to control”.

Mr Chan added that Papua New Guinea had little influence over de cisions made by larger countries. But it was able to control relations with those countries.