Png Plans For Torres Solution

Papua New Guinea has admitted for the first time the possibility that it may fail to reach agreement with Australia over the location of the Torres Strait border.

“It is certainly possible that the present negotiations will not be successful,”

Foreign Minister, Sir Maori Kiki told the National Parliament in a formal statement in the middle of June.

In the event of failure, the government would take “whatever steps are necessary to protect our national interests,” he said.

This is taken to indicate that failure of the talks would lead to two developments.

PNG would probably declare a border of

its own thus creating a formal inter national dispute (there is no such dispute at present). PNG (and presumably also Australia) would then take the dispute to the International Court of Justice for a decision.

Sir Maori disclosed for the first time that one of the major grounds on which the talks are based is an agreed contention that no legal border at present exists. He said PNG had not possessed the autonomy un til recently to fix or to negotiate a border.

At the same time, Australia had not dis puted a contention that one country acting alone could not fix a mutual border.