Pacific Review

PNG's Prime Minister is digging his heels in over attempts to arrest him. PNG's new lands minister says his department is corrupt from top to bottom, and cleansing it will be one of his most important tasks.

The Governor of Guam, Eddie Calvo, posted a nationwide address on Youtube and called for calm in the wake of threats from North Korea to launch an attack on the US Pacific territory. An activist leader who was among the group of settlers thrown off a waterfront settlement in Port Moresby is seeking asylum in the United Kingdom.

Peter O'Neill was elected as the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea's 10th Parliament earlier this week. Peter O'Neill is now in a weakened position, having lost several supporters as a result of the election.

Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Peter O'Neil is claiming he has enough support to form the next government. In the National Capital District, events took a bizarre twist in the Moresby North-West constituency when the returning officer went missing, and then privately declared the third-placed candidate as the winner.

While counting continues in PNG's national election, the Media Council says there's been a disturbing push to restrict freedom of speech. Transparency International PNG say they're concerned that a multi-million dollar contract to supply health clinics has been awarded to Borneo Pacific Pharmaceuticals, when other companies were offering a cheaper deal.

Papua New Guinea elections. A spate of suspicious deaths of Pacific Fisheries observers at sea. Where will the Pacific Games go now that Tonga has pulled out of its hosting duties?

A provincial governor in Papua New Guinea has blasted the state of the electoral rolls in the country after being told his name wasn't on the list when he tried to vote. Australia is supporting Fiji's presidency of COP 23, the global climate change conference, with a six million dollar grant.

It was a tumultuous day of polling in PNG's second largest city Lae yesterday due to a widespread shortage of ballot papers and missing names from the electoral roll. A week of commemorations to mark the exit of the regional intervention in Solomon Islands have ended with a flourish, with fireworks lighting up the night sky in Honiara City.

A Pakistani organisation which was contracted to implement an election management system in Fiji has been accused of corruption. Vanuatu's capital came to a standstill today, with thousands of school children and other citizens lining the streets to farewell the country's late President, Father Baldwin Lonsdale, who died at the weekend from a suspected heart attack.

A Catholic missionary who tried to help villagers in Papua New Guinea take on a giant Malaysian logging company has been deported. PNG is also deporting two American Lutheran missionaries from the country, claiming they are no longer employed by the church organisation sponsoring them.

Why is PNG's Police Commissioner so determined to crack down on the remnants of the country's anti-corruption task force which was disbanded three years ago? We meet the Queensland university researcher who believes the next Usain Bolt might just be found in the PNG Highlands.

There's widespread disappointment in the Pacific to the US President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw his country from the Paris Climate Agreement, which aims to limit global temperature rises. The governments of Australia and New Zealand are being urged to ramp up the pressure on Fiji over human rights by Robin Nair, his country's former secretary of foreign affairs.

International human rights organisations are calling for an independent inquiry into the recent mass jailbreak in Papua New Guinea, during which 17 inmates were shot dead. Tough economic times are affecting Papua New Guinea's normally colourful election campaign.

Tonga's Prikme Minister sent shockwaves through the region this week by suddenly announcing his government was pulling out of hosting the Pacific Games in 2019. Asylum-seekers on Manus Island have been told they must leave the Australian-funded detention centre and move into the main town.

Police in Solomon Islands have begun to carry guns for the first time since the country was torn apart by ethnic violence in the late 1990s. Australia's foreign aid budget freeze has raised questions about whether the country is being as generous as it could be.