Australian FM welcomes Bougainville peace treaty
Australian FM welcomes Bougainville peace treaty
CANBERRA (AFP): Australia applauded Friday Papua New Guinean moves to sign a peace treaty that signals the end of a secessionist war on the restive island of Bougainville.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and his opposition counterpart Laurie Brereton will travel to Bougainville next week to witness the signing of the ground-breaking treaty.
The pair will fly to the former capital of Bougainville, Arawa, to take part in the signing ceremony next Thursday.
The treaty signing will formally mark the end of a decade of civil war in PNG's easternmost province more than three years after an often shaky truce was called between Papua New Guinea and Bougainvillean guerrilla fighters.
"It is a very welcome development in reaching a settlement in Bougainville," a spokesman for Downer said Friday.
PNG government ministers and officials, New Zealand's Foreign Minister Phil Goff and United Nations peace monitor Noel Sinclair will also witness the signing.
The signing of the treaty was flagged in Papua New Guinea's parliament Thursday by Bougainville's governor, former Catholic priest John Momis, who will head an autonomous island government of what is now officially called the North Solomons Province.
Up to 20,000 lives were lost during the war, which pitted the Bougainville Revolutionary Army against the PNG defense force.
Violence erupted in 1989 when rebels blew up power pylons servicing Australian miner CRA's (now Rio Tinto's) Panguna gold and copper mine, which generated most of PNG's foreign exchange earnings.
Local clansmen, led by Francis Ona, accused the mine's operators of polluting tribally-held lands and diluting locals' equity in the project.
Under a peace deal negotiated in the three years since the 1998 cease-fire, Bougainville will receive autonomous powers to establish its own judiciary, police force and tax regime.
Ona and his still-armed Me'ekamui Defense Force guerrillas, who have thus far remained outside the peace process, are expected to sanction the Arawa signing, Australian officials said.