Pacific Report

□ Pacific Aid

Representatives Of The South Pa

cific countries have criticised the aid and trade policies of the industrialised world.

Solomon Islands Finance Minister Mr George Kejoa told the joint meeting of the World Bank and the International Mone tary Fund in Washington last month that the US and other aid donors had promised to transfer real aid to the Third World.

Mr Kejoa, speaking on behalf of Solo mon Islands, Kiribati, Vanuatu and West ern Samoa, said that in recent years, thousands of millions of dollars had been used instead to pay off interest on Third World debt.

Papua New Guinea Finance Minister Mr Galeva Kwarara complained at the meeting that wealthy countries had not kept promises they made on trade during negotiations in Tokyo in the late 19705. He also expressed concern about the outflow of funds from poor countries.

Mr Kwarara said Papua New Guinea was alarmed by forecasts suggesting that major institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF would soon be taking more resources from the Third World than they sent to it.

□ Vanuatu Fetes Wingti

PNG PM Mr Wingti was made a chief of Vanuatu’s main island of Efate at a wel coming ceremony in Port Vila. The cus tom chiefs of the island laid their hands on his head and gave him the honoured name Maukoro, meaning head warrior and de fender. During the ceremony, Mr Wingti clubbed a pig to death in a symbolic ce menting of peaceful relations between Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu. Vanu atu’s Prime Minister, Father Lini, spoke of the importance of traditional culture to the Melanesian island countries. Mr Wingti said the people of Melanesia were one people. Mr Wingti and Father Lini later began talks during which they were to discuss developments in Fiji. Mr Wingti was visiting Solomon Islands and Vanu atu on his way to the CHOGM meeting in Canada.

□ Earthquake Recorded

A MAJOR earthquake occurred 400 kil ometres south of Western Samoa. The quake measured seven points on the Ri chter scale, but because of its location it did not generate a Pacific-wide tsunami, or tidal wave. There were no inhabited is lands near the epicentre of the earthquake.

A police spokesman in Apia said there had been no reports of damage or injuries.

□ Honiara Bust-Out

ABOUT 130 prisoners escaped from the Rove prison, Honiara, after a riot. They looted shops in Honiara, stealing food, liquor and clothing. Many of them were recaptured. Solomon Island prison offi cials let the remaining prisoners out ofjail so the guards could take part in the search for those who had escaped. Those released were told to return to prison when the escapees had been rounded up. □ SOUTH PACIFIC VILLAGE AT EXPO 88 SEVEN SOUTH Pacific nations will steal the show when World Expo 88 opens in Brisbane in April next year. Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Tonga, The Cook Islands,

Solomon Islands, Western Samoa and Vanuatu will exhibit with an emphasis on the modern and traditional aspects of tourism, dancing, handicrafts, fishing and carvings.

A lagoon, surrounded by grass huts, caves, waterfalls, bridges and artifacts will be the site of the displays (see artist’s impression above).

Says Expo South Pacific Co-ordination Committee member, Keithie Saunders, “Tourism will fit in with Expo’s theme of ‘Leisure in the Age of Technology’ and handicraft is also a leisure activity. There will be dancing and exhibitions daily and people will be able to watch such activities as traditional war canoes being carved.”

Features of the South Pacific Lagoon will include a Samoan oval fale (island house); pan pipes; traditional dancing

groups; war canoes; hand carving dem onstrations; and a Fijian meeting house.

□ Png Premiers’ Mine Royalty Call

PAPUA NEW Guinea premiers called on the national Government to pay all min ing royalty monies owed to them. The amount was not disclosed, but the pre miers believe a lot of money is owing.

At their conference in Lae, the pre miers also resolved that the Fisheries Act and regulations be amended to allow more consultation between the national and provincial governments on fishing lic ences, and the exploitation of marine re sources in the provinces. In a separate submission, the five Papuan provinces

also demanded prawn export royalties be paid to them.

□ Png Timber Strife

A JUDICIAL inquiry in Port Moresby was told that most timber operations in Papua New Guinea’s New Ireland Province were illegal. The assistant Secretary of the For est Department, Mr Mentu, said also that most joint ventures between local land owners and foreign companies had failed because foreign companies harvested tim ber, but did not carry out re-forestation and other projects agreed to in contracts.

Mr Mentu was giving evidence before an inquiry investigating claims of wide spread corruption in Papua New Guinea’s timber industry. It is now investigating timber operations on a province by prov ince basis. □

□ Australia-France Shake Hands

THE AUSTRALIAN Foreign Minister Mr Hayden had talks with French Foreign Minister Mr Raimond in New York. The meeting ended a nine-month ban by the French Government on ministerial con tacts with Australia because of Australia’s support for the relisting of New Caledonia with the United Nations Decolonisation Committee. Mr Hayden said his talks with Mr Raimond touched on New Caledonia and French nuclear testing in the Pacific, adding that the discussion was direct, but not aggressive. Mr Hayden added that

Australia and France generally had very good relations, but had to leam to live with their differences over the question of New Caledonia.

Meanwhile, an Australian human rights delegation was refused entry into New Caledonia. The three-man delega tion, which included former South Aus tralian Premier Mr Don Dunstan was planning to visit New Caledonia as part of a study into the Melanesian way of life. The executive director of the Herbert Vere Ev att Foundation, Mr John Scott Murphy, said the non-political aim of the delega tion had been stressed to the French and the move could have been an attempt to prevent exposure of the local Kanak living standard.

□ Png’S Wagga League Test

AUSTRALIA WILL play a rugby league Test match against Papua New Guinea at Wagga in the New South Wales Riverina District next year. The one-off Test on July 20 will count for World Cup points. It will

be the first time Australia has played a home Test against PNG and only the third time the two countries have met. The Ku muls, as Papua New Guinea is known, are now touring Great Britain and France.

□ Nz Post In Kiribati

NEW ZEALAND will set up a small dip lomatic post in Kiribati by the beginning of 1989. The move is part of a program to upgrade New Zealand’s presence in Mi cronesia. At present Kiribati has two dip lomatic missions from Australia and Britain.

□ Png Upgrades Education

PNG IS TO make big changes in its na tional education system to raise standards and meet the needs of the country. Edu cation Minister Mr Aruru Matiabe said the changes were needed because of a drop in standards in the past 10 years. He said the changes would occur over the next five years and the Education Secretary, the Commission of Higher Education and the Vice Chancellors of the nation’s two uni versities had already started the process.

Under the new system all areas of educa tion would be studied to make sure there was no waste of money and no duplication of courses.

□ Png Police Scandal

PNG WAS HIT by a police corruption scandal. An internal police inquiry into the handling of investigations into one of PNG’s biggest robberies earlier this year resulted in one policeman appearing in court and others being questioned. The constable appeared in court in Lae on charges of masterminding the theft of more than K 165,000 in transit between the Westpac branch of Lae and the bank’s head office in Port Moresby.

Allegations have also been made that policemen have accepted substantial amounts of money in bribes to ensure sus pects were not convicted.

□ Irian Java Aid

AUSTRALIA IS providing more than $500,000 this financial year to help the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees relocate Irianese border crossers into a more permanent camp further in side Papua New Guinea. In 1984 more than 10,000 Irianese fled into Papua New Guinea from the Indonesian Province of Irian Jaya and more than 9,000 remain in temporary camps close to the border. A relocation program to a camp at East Awin

in Papua New Guinea’s sparsely populated western province began in Sep tember. About 400 refugees are expected to make the move to East Awin each month until at least the end of 1987.

Meanwhile, a series of shuttle charter flights began the repatriation to Indonesia of up to 600 Irianese border crossers, who had been living in makeshift refugee camps in Papua New Guinea since 1984.

□ Death Sect Charges

POLICE in French Polynesia arrested six more people in connection with the burn ing alive of six people on the tiny atoll of Faaite. They bring to 16 the number of ar rests in connection with the September 3 incident. Ten of those arrested are mem bers of an organisation called the Charis matic Renewal Cult, an American religious sect which combines elements from Cath olic and Protestant beliefs. A priest from Papeete was quoted as saying the slayings were part of a mission of exorcism incited by three women claiming to be members of the sect. However, the three women were released after questioning by investigators.

□ France’S Nuclear Offer

FRANCE INVITED the leaders of South American countries bordering the Pacific to see for themselves its nuclear test site at Muroroa as a counter to protests about French nuclear testing. French Foreign Minister Mr Jean Bernard Raimond an nounced the move in an address to the United Nations General Assembly. Dur ing the address, Mr Raimond restated the refusal of the French PM, Mr Chirac, to halt the country’s nuclear testing.

□ South Pacific Conference

The 27th conference of the South Pa cific Commission has ended in Noumea with dominant members promising more money and to boost efforts to find financ ing for aid programs.

Three of the commission’s 27 mem bers, Papua New Guinea, Marshall Is lands and Vanuatu, stayed away from the conference: PNG has descirbed the Nou mea-based commission (founded in 1947 to develop aid programs for countries in the South Pacific) as colonial, and said it wanted the commission scrapped.

Australia and other dominant mem bers France, Britain, the United States and New Zealand have agreed to increase their contributions to the commission and to try to get other contributions from non-mem ber countries such as Japan. □

Hayden: agreeing to disagree.