Posted on 07/01/2003 5:03:45 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
South Pacific leaders have pledged their support for the unprecedented deployment of foreign police officers and troops to restore law and order in the troubled Solomon Islands, approving an Australian-led initiative to act when necessary rather than await a U.N. go-ahead.
Foreign ministers from 16 Pacific nations, meeting in Sydney, unanimously endorsed a proposal to send a multinational force to the Solomon Islands, to help a government battling against violent militias and corruption.
Australia and New Zealand are to provide the bulk of the envisaged stabilization force, with other Pacific nations also considering contributing personnel.
The plan also includes an aid package to help re-establish effective justice, policing and prisons sectors, and other vital services that have virtually collapsed.
Up to 2,000 troops and police could arrive in the country by late July.
Australia has warned that the existence of "failed states" in the region could provide havens for international criminals and terrorists.
Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said last week the U.N. would be informed about the plan, but that the region could not wait for the international institution to act.
His Solomon Islands counterpart, Laurie Chan, said his embattled government had twice last year appealed formally to the U.N. to provide peacekeepers, "but that aid was not forthcoming."
New Zealand Foreign Minister Phil Goff said U.N. officials had now expressed support for the regional initiative.
Both Australian and New Zealand governments were keen to win support from Pacific island nations for the planned intervention, to ensure they were not accused of Western "neo-colonialism" in a region of former protectorates that won their independence just decades ago.
Although they have now got that backing from the wider region and support from opposition parties at home, the planned intervention is not without some critics.
An Australian left-wing journal, Green Left Weekly, accused Prime Minister John Howard of using the same reasoning to explain the need to intervene in the Solomon Islands as he did in justifying sending troops to participate in the U.S.-led war against Iraq.
Howard, it said, was arguing that "a hypothetical future threat to Australia's 'national security' requires immediate pre-emptive military action."
The publication charged that Australia's real reason for wanting to intervene was to secure business and investment opportunities in the Solomon Islands.
It also aimed to "demonstrate to Washington that Canberra can be a reliable deputy sheriff in the South Pacific," it added.
Once dubbed "the Happy Isles," the Solomon Islands have been beset by violence and corruption for several years, with ethnic groups from the two main islands, Malaita and Guadalcanal, fighting over limited resources.
Hundreds of people have been killed in the fighting, which continued despite an Australian-brokered peace agreement in Oct. 2000.
The islands were the location of some of the most ferocious fighting between allies and Japanese during World War II.
The UN is only interested when they can further the Islamic jihad. These islanders are not moslems, and therefore not interesting to the UN.
Sounds like the setting for a computer game. FPS, RTS, etc. Throw in some hidden relics and magic and it could be an RPG.
It's bad when life imitates cheap entertainment.
The Marching Rule Movement, which tried to buy American officers to lead an anti-colonial army in the immediate post-WWII years, was also based on Malaita.
The MRM stemmed from the Malaitans close and warm relationship with American GI's, who filled their heads with ideas such as freedom and prosperity.
The MRM followers abandoned their traditional villages and built new ones styled on the American military bases they had worked at on Guadalcanal, the Russells, New Georgia, etc.
The Malaitans, along with the New Georgians, were among the most fierce head-hunters back in the pre-Christian days.
They are some tough dudes.
Hopefully, they'll resist this foreign invasion and add some digger skulls to their well-kept skull shrines.
the scary monkeys are too tough for us:(
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