Voicing
pp. 16-17 · Read in the full issue
The Region
Palau
Voicing approval for the Compact
By Ed Rampell
THE United States House of Repre sentatives approved the proposed Compact of Free Association be tween the Republic of Palau and the Un ited States by a voice vote in the Con gress on June 27, taking a major step forward toward implementing a prop osed Compact of Free Association be tween the two nations. The legislative package includes the Subsidiary Agree ments signed by Palau Vice-President Kuniwo Nakamura and the U.S. State Department’s James Berg at Guam on May 26.
This enhanced accord provides Palau with additional funding of at least US$9.3 million for a hospital, prison,
and an anti-drug programme. A special prosecutor and public auditor will also be appointed to investigate the violence and corruption plaguing the Micronesian nation. In addition, the House bill makes up to US$36 million available to Palau to pay off the onerous debt incurred by the IPSECO power project.
But anti-nuclear and other treaty opponents hold the trump card in Compact electoral politics, since the accord requires a 75 percent vote in order to override a constitutional nuclear ban,
which it has repeatedly failed to garner since 1983. The Compact of Free Asso ciation remains, in essence, the same document, which Congressman Ron De Lugo, told the House from the Virgin Islands, on June 27 “would provide Palau with self-governing authority in all matters other than those affecting secur ity. The United States would retain full military rights in Palau . . . (including) the authority to deny military access to any other country in perpetuity. They also include the requirement that Palau
make land designated by the U.S. avail able for military bases for 50 years. In combination with bases in Guam and base rights in the Northern Mariana Is lands, these base rights figure into almost any scenario for alternatives to our important bases in the Philippines . . . 500 miles from Palau.”
The proposed Compact would phase out a 42-year-old American administered United Nations Strategic Trust in the strategically located Western Pacific archipelago. As representative Stephen Solarz pointed out on June 27, the Com pact “is of considerable importance . . . to larger American interests in the South Pacific”. But as Solarz, the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs, pointed out, the Constitution’s nuclear free provision and 75 percent requirement will stand in the way of the overall United States strategic game plan regarding military and nuclear policies for Micronesia and the rest of Oceania.
House Joint Resolution 175 makes concessions regarding two essential stick ing points: land rights provisions and the IPSECO power debt. As lawyer and for mer Palau Senator Johnson Toribiong once said, the Compact, along with its
Subsidiary Agreements, are legalese
“masterpieces in cross-references”, hence making them difficult to comprehend.
Originally, the Compact stipulated that
the Palau government would provide land within 60 days for sites selected by the military; the Republic would also compensate the landownwers. The U.S. would provide only US$5.5 million for land it had option on. Compact critics such as activist attorney Roman Bedor maintain that under the treaty, the Pen tagon has rights to up to one third of Palau’s land.
But Subsidiary Agreements amend this. De Lugo told Congress: “The U.S. would be committed to enter into agree ments for financial assistance if re quested by Palau to acquire land, other than at the airfield and harbour, that the U.S. requires Palau to provide . . . Palau would not be obligated to make such land available until such agreement are reached. The U.S. would be committed to extend the 60-day period ... if Palau justifies such an extension.”
Regarding the disastrous IPSECO power project, which has plunged Palau into a US$4B million debt upon its birth, the Subsidiary Agreements allow Palau to provide funds set aside for energy and capital improvements over the 15year term of Compact funding. The multi-national consortium of bankers, which has successfully sued Palau in a United States federal court, agreed to a deadline whereby the financiers will accept the millions made available to the Republic for IPSECO by the House leg islation.