Pacific advocacy movements and civil society organisations have challenged French credentials in hosting a global ocean conference, saying that unless France is accountable for its actions in the Pacific, it is merely “rebranding”.

The call for accountability marked the French-sponsored UN Ocean Conference (UNOC) in Nice this week, during which President Emmanuel Macron will be hosting a France-Pacific Summit.

French officials have described the UNOC event as a coming together “in the true spirit of Talanoa” and one that would be inconceivable without the Pacific.

• READ MORE: Former Congress staffer allowed to return to Kanaky New Caledonia
• Other France in the Pacific reports

While acknowledging the importance of leveraging global partnerships for urgent climate action and ocean protection through the UNOC process, Pacific civil society groups have issued a joint statement saying that their political leaders must hold France accountable for its past actions and not allow it to “launder its dirty linen in ‘Blue Pacific’ and ‘critical transition’ narratives”.

‘Responsible steward’ image undermined
France’s claims of being a “responsible steward” of the ocean were undermined by its historical actions in the Pacific, said the statement. This included:

● A brutal colonial legacy dating back to the mid-1800s, with the annexation of island nations now known as Kanaky-New Caledonia and Ma’ohi Nui-French Polynesia;

● A refusal to complete the decolonisation process, and in fact the perpetuation of the colonial condition, particularly for the those “territories” on the UN decolonisation list. In Kanaky-New Caledonia, for instance, France and its agents continue to renege on longstanding decolonisation commitments, while weaponising democratic ideals and processes such as “universal” voting rights to deny the fundamental rights of the indigenous population to self-determination;

● 30 years of nuclear violence in Ma’ohi Nui-French Polynesia with 193 test detonations — 46 in the atmosphere and close to 150 under the Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls, irradiating both land and sea, and people. Approximately 90 percent of the local population was exposed to radioactive fallout, resulting in long-term health impacts, including elevated rates of cancer and other radiation-related illnesses;

● Active efforts to obscure the true extent of its nuclear violence in Maʻohi Nui-French Polynesia, diverting resources to discredit independent research and obstructing transparency around health and environmental impacts. These actions reveal a persistent pattern of denial and narrative control that continues to undermine compensation efforts and delay justice for victims and communities;

● French claims to approximately one-third of the Pacific’s combined EEZ, and to being the world’s second largest ocean state, accruing largely from its so-called Pacific dependencies; and

● The supply of French military equipment, and the 1985 bombing of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior by French secret service agents — a state-sponsored terrorist attack with the 40th anniversary this year.

Seeking diplomatic support
“Since the late 1980s, France has worked to build on diplomatic, development and defence fronts to garner support from Pacific governments.

This includes development assistance through the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), Asian Development Fund, language and cultural exchanges, scientific collaboration and humanitarian assistance.

A strong diplomatic presence in Pacific capitals as well as a full schedule of high-level exchanges, including a triennial France-Oceania leaders’ Summit commencing in 2003, together function to enhance proximity with and inclination towards Paris sentiments and priorities.

The Pacific civil society statement said that French leadership at this UNOC process was once again central to its ongoing efforts to rebrand itself as a global leader on climate action, a champion of ocean protection, and a promoter of sovereignty.

“Nothing can be further from the truth,” the groups said.

“The reality is that France is rather more interested in strengthening its position as a middle power in an Indo-Pacific rather than a Pacific framework, and as a balancing power within the context of big-power rivalry between the US and China, all of which undermines rather than enhances Pacific sovereignty.”

New global image
The statement said that leaders must not allow France to build this new global image on the “foundations of its atrocities against Pacific peoples” and the ocean continent.

Pacific civil society called on France:

● For immediate and irreversible commitments and practical steps to bring its colonial presence in the Pacific to an end before the conclusion, in 2030, of the 4th International Decade on the Eradication of Colonialism; and

● To acknowledge and take responsibility for the oceanic and human harms caused by 30 years of nuclear violence in Maʻohi Nui–French Polynesia, and to commit to full and just reparations, including support for affected communities, environmental remediation of test sites, and full public disclosure of all health and contamination data.

The statement also called on Pacific leaders to:

● Keep France accountable for its multiple and longstanding debt to Pacific people; and

● Ensure that Ma’ohi Nui-French Polynesia and Kanaky-New Caledonia remain on the UN list of non-self-governing territories to be decolonised (UN decolonisation list).

“Pacific leaders must ensure that France does not succeed in laundering its soiled linen — soiled by the blood of thousands of Pacific Islanders who resisted colonial occupation and/or who were used as test subjects for its industrial-military machinery — in the UNOC process,” said the statement.

New Caledonia and French Polynesia have sent strong delegations this week to the United Nations Pacific regional seminar on the implementation of the Fourth International Decade for the Eradication of Colonialism in Timor-Leste.

The seminar opened in Dili today and ends on Friday.

As French Pacific non-self-governing territories, the two Pacific possessions will brief the UN on recent developments at the event, which is themed “Pathways to a sustainable future — advancing socioeconomic and cultural development of the Non-Self-Governing Territories”.

• READ MORE: New Caledonia riots one year on: ‘Like the country was at war’
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

New Caledonia and French Polynesia are both in the UN’s list of non-self-governing territories to be decolonised, respectively since 1986 and 2013.

Nouméa-based French Ambassador for the Pacific Véronique Roger-Lacan is also attending.

After the Dili meeting this week, the UN’s Fourth Commission is holding its formal meeting in New York in July and again in October in the margins of the UN General Assembly.

As New Caledonia marks the first anniversary this month of the civil unrest that killed 14 people and caused material damage to the tune of 2.2 billion euros last year (NZ$4.1 billion), the French Pacific territory’s political parties have been engaged for the past four months in political talks with France to define New Caledonia’s political future.

However, the talks have not yet managed to produce a consensual way forward between pro-France and pro-independence groups.

French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls, at the end of the most recent session on May 8, put a project of “sovereignty with France” on the table which was met by strong opposition by the pro-France Loyalists (anti-independence) camp.

This year again, parties and groups from around the political spectrum are planning to travel to Dili to plead their respective cases.

Topping the list is New Caledonia’s government President Alcide Ponga, who chairs the pro-France Rassemblement party and came to power in January 2025.

Other represented institutions include New Caledonia’s customary (traditional) Senate, a kind of Great Council of Chiefs, which also sends participants to ensure the voice of indigenous Kanak people is heard.

Over the past two years, pro-France groups have become more aware of the need for them to be more vocal and present at regional and international fora.

French Polynesia back on the UN list since 2013
In French Polynesia, the pro-independence ruling Tavini Huiraatira party commemorated the 12th anniversary of re-inscription to the UN list of territories to be decolonised on 17 May 2013.

This week, Tavini also sent a strong delegation to Timor-Leste, which includes territorial Assembly President Antony Géros.

However, the pro-France parties, locally known as “pro-autonomy”, also want to ensure their views are taken into account.

One of them is Moerani Frébault, one of French Polynesia’s representatives at the French National Assembly.

“Contrary to what the pro-independence people are saying, we’re not dominated by the French Republic,” he told local media at a news conference at the weekend.

Frébault said the pro-autonomy parties now want to invite a UN delegation to French Polynesia “so they can see for themselves that we have all the tools we need for our development.

“This is the message we want to get across”.

Territorial Assembly member Tepuaraurii Teriitahi, from the pro-autonomy Tapura Huiraatira party, is also travelling to Dili.

“The majority of (French) Polynesians is not pro-independence. So when we travel to this kind of seminar, it is because we want to counter those who allege that the whole of (French) Polynesians is sharing this aspiration for independence,” she said.

‘Constitution of a Federated Republic of Ma’ohi Nui’
On the pro-independence side in Pape’ete, the official line is that it wants Paris to at least engage in talks with French Polynesia to “open the subject of decolonisation”.

For the same purpose, the Tavini Party, in April 2025, officially presented a draft for what could become a “Constitution of a Federated Republic of Ma’ohi Nui”.

The document is sometimes described as drawing inspirations from France and the United States, but is not yet regarded as fully matured.

Earlier this month, French Polynesia’s President Moetai Brotherson was in Paris for a series of meetings with several members of the French cabinet, including Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls and French Foreign Affairs Minister Yannick Neuder.

Valls is currently contemplating visiting French Polynesia early in July.

Brotherson came to power in May 2023. Since being elected to the top post, he has stressed that independence — although it remained a longterm goal — was not an immediate priority.

He also said many times that he wished relations with France to evolve, especially on the decolonisation.

“I think we should put those 10 years of misunderstanding, of denial of dialogue behind us,” he said.

In October 2023, for the first time since French Polynesia was re-inscribed on the UN list, France made representations at the UN Special Political and Decolonisation Committee (Fourth Committee), ending a 10-year empty chair hiatus .

But the message delivered by the French Ambassador to the UN, Nicolas De Rivière, was unambiguous.

He said French Polynesia “has no place” on the UN list of non-autonomous territories because “French Polynesia’s history is not the history of New Caledonia”.

He also voiced France’s wish to have French Polynesia withdrawn from the UN list.

The UN list of non-self-governing territories currently includes 17 territories worldwide and six of those are located in the Pacific — American Samoa, Guam, French Polynesia, New Caledonia, Pitcairn Islands and Tokelau.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Debate on Guam’s future as a US territory has intensified with its legislature due to vote on a non-binding resolution to become a US state amid mounting Pacific geostrategic tensions and expansionist declarations by the Trump administration.

Located closer to Beijing than Hawai’i, Guam serves as a key US strategic asset, known as the “tip of the spear,” with 10,000 military personnel, an air base for F-35 fighters and B-2 bombers and home port for Virginia-class nuclear submarines.

The small US territory of 166,000 people is also listed by the UN for decolonisation and last year became an associate member at the Pacific Islands Forum.

• READ MORE: Other Guam reports

Local Senator William A. Parkinson introduced the resolution to the legislature last Wednesday and called for Guam to be fully integrated into the American union, possibly as the 51st state.

“We are standing in a moment of history where two great empires are standing face-to-face with each other, about to go to war,” Parkinson said at a press conference on Thursday.

“We have to be real about what’s going on in this part of the world. We are a tiny island but we are too strategically important to be left alone. Stay with America or do we let ourselves be absorbed by China?”

His resolution states the decision “must be built upon the informed consent of the people of Guam through a referendum”.

Trump’s expansionist policies
Parkinson’s resolution comes as US President Donald Trump advocates territorially expansionist policies, particularly towards the strategically located Danish-ruled autonomous territory of Greenland and America’s northern neighbour, Canada.

“This one moment in time, this one moment in history, the stars are aligning so that the geopolitics of the United States favour statehood for Guam,” Parkinson said. “This is an opportunity we cannot pass up.”

As a territory, Guam residents are American citizens but they cannot vote for the US president and their lone delegate to the Congress has no voting power on the floor.

The US acquired Guam, along with Puerto Rico, in 1898 after winning the Spanish-American War, and both remain unincorporated territories to this day.

Independence advocates and representatives from the Guam Commission on Decolonisation regularly testify at the UN’s Decolonisation Committee, where the island has been listed as a Non-Self-Governing Territory since 1946.

Commission on Decolonisation executive director Melvin Won Pat-Borja said he was not opposed to statehood but is concerned if any decision on Guam’s status was left to the US.

“Decolonisation is the right of the colonised,” he said while attending Parkinson’s press conference, the Pacific Daily News reported.

‘Hands of our coloniser’
“It’s counterintuitive to say that, ‘we’re seeking a path forward, a path out of this inequity,’ and then turn around and put it right back in the hands of our coloniser.

“No matter what status any of us prefer, ultimately that is not for any one of us to decide, but it is up to a collective decision that we have to come to, and the only way to do it is via referendum,” he said, reports Kuam News.

With the geostrategic competition between the US and China in the Pacific, Guam has become increasingly significant in supporting American naval and air operations, especially in the event of a conflict over Taiwan or in the South China Sea.

The two US bases have seen Guam’s economy become heavily reliant on military investments and tourism.

The Defence Department holds about 25 percent of Guam’s land and is preparing to spend billions to upgrade the island’s military infrastructure as another 5000 American marines relocate there from Japan’s Okinawa islands.

Guam is also within range of Chinese and North Korean ballistic missiles and the US has trialed a defence system, with the first tests held in December.

The “moment in history” for statehood may also be defined by the Trump administration spending cuts, Guam Governor Lou Leon Guerrero warned in her “state of the island” address on Wednesday.

Military presence leveraged
The island has in recent years leveraged the increased military presence to demand federal assistance and the territory’s treasury relies on at least US$0.5 billion in annual funding.

“Let us be clear about this: Guam cannot be the linchpin of American security in the Asian-Pacific if nearly 14,000 of our residents are without shelter, because housing aid to Guam is cut, or if 36,000 of our people lose access to Medicaid and Medicare coverage keeping them healthy, alive and out of poverty,” Guerrero said.

Parkinson’s proposed legislative resolution calls for an end to 125-plus years of US colonial uncertainty.

“The people of Guam, as the rightful stewards of their homeland, must assert their inalienable right to self-determination,” states the resolution, including that there be a “full examination of statehood or enhanced autonomous status for Guam.”

“Granting Guam equal political status would signal unequivocally that Guam is an integral part of the United States, deterring adversaries who might otherwise perceive Guam as a mere expendable outpost.”

If adopted by the Guam legislature, the non-binding resolution would be transmitted to the White House.

A local statute enacted in 2000 for a political status plebiscite on statehood, independence or free association has become bogged down in US courts.

‘Reject colonial status quo’
Neil Weare, a former Guam resident and co-director of Right to Democracy, said the self-determination process must be centred on what the people of Guam want, “not just what’s best for US national security”.

“Right to Democracy does not take a position on political status, other than to reject the undemocratic and colonial status quo,” Weare said on behalf of the nonprofit organisation that advocates for rights and self-determination in US territories.

“People can have different views on what is the best solution to this problem, but we should all be in agreement that the continued undemocratic rule of millions of people in US territories is wrong and needs to end.”

He said the 250th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence next year can open a new venue for a conversation about key concepts — such as the “consent of the governed” — involving Guam and other US territories.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

France has been criticised for the “alarming” death toll in New Caledonia during recent protests and its “cold shower” approach to decolonisation by experts of the UN Human Rights Committee.

The UN committee met this week in Geneva for France’s five-yearly human rights review with a focus on its Pacific territory, after peaceful protests over electoral changes turned violent leaving 13 people dead since May.

French delegates at the hearing defended the country’s actions and rejected the jurisdiction of the UN decolonisation process, saying the country “no longer has any international obligations”.

• READ MORE: PM defends Fiji’s UN ‘ambush’ vote – challenged by human rights advocate
• Rabuka’s message to free Kanaky movement: ‘Don’t slap the hand that feeds you’
• ‘We’ll be talking about the future of negotiations’, says Rabuka on New Caledonia mission
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports
• Other CHOGM reports

A delayed fact-finding mission of Pacific Islands Forum leaders is due to arrive in New Caledonia this weekend to assess the situation on behalf of the region’s peak regional inter-governmental body.

Almost 7000 security personnel with armoured vehicles have been deployed from France to New Caledonia to quell further unrest.

“The means used and the intensity of their response and the gravity of the violence reported, as well as the amount of dead and wounded, are particularly alarming,” said committee member Jose Santo Pais, assistant Prosecutor-General of the Portuguese Constitutional Court.

“There have been numerous allegations regarding an excessive use of force and that would have led to numerous deaths among the Kanak people and law enforcement,” the committee’s vice-chair said on Wednesday.

Months of protests
Violence erupted after months of protests over a unilateral attempt by President Emmanuel Macron to “unfreeze” the territory’s electoral roll. Indigenous Kanaks feared the move would dilute their voting power and any chance of success at another independence referendum.

Eleven Kanaks and two French police have died. The committee heard 169 people were wounded and 2658 arrested in the past five months.

New Caledonia’s economy is in ruins with hundreds of businesses destroyed, tens-of-thousands left jobless and the local government seeking 4 billion euros (US$4.33 billion) in recovery funds from France.

France’s reputation has been left battered as an out-of-touch colonial power since the deadly violence erupted.

Santos Pais questioned France’s commitment to the UN Declaration on Indigenous People and the “sufficient dialogue” required under the Nouméa Accord, a peace agreement signed in 1998 to politically empower Kanak people, that enabled the decolonisation process.

“It would seem that current violence in the territory is linked to the lack of progress in decolonisation,” said Santos Pais.

Last week, the new French Prime Minister announced controversial electoral changes that sparked the protests had been abandoned. Local elections, due to be held this year, will now take place at the end of 2025.

Pacific mission
Tomorrow, Tonga’s prime minister Hu’akavameiliku Siaosi Sovaleni will lead a Pacific “observational” mission to New Caledonia of fellow leaders from Cook Islands, Fiji and Solomon Islands Minister for Foreign Affairs, together known as the “Troika-Plus”.

The PIF leaders’ three-day visit to the capital Nouméa will see them meet with local political parties, youth and community groups, private sector and public service providers.

“Our thoughts have always been with the people of New Caledonia since the unrest earlier this year, and we continue to offer our support,” Sovaleni said in a statement on Friday.

The UN committee is a treaty body composed of 18 experts that regularly reviews compliance by 173 member states with their human rights obligations and is separate from the Human Rights Council, a political body composed of states.

Serbian committee member Tijana Surlan asked France for an update on investigations into injuries and fatalities “related to alleged excessive use of force” in New Caledonia. She asked if police firearms use would be reviewed “to strike a better balance with the principles of absolute necessity and strict proportionality.”

France’s delegation responded saying it was “committed to renewing dialogue” in New Caledonia and to striking a balance between the right to demonstrate and protecting people and property with the “principle of proportionality.”

Alleged intimidation by French authorities of at least five journalists covering the unrest in New Caledonia was highlighted by committee member Kobauyah Tchamdja Kapatcha from Togo. France responded saying it guarantees freedom of the press.

France rejects ‘obligations’
The French delegation led by Ambassador for Human Rights Isabelle Rome added it “no longer administers a non-self-governing territory.”

France “no longer has any international obligations in this regard linked to its membership in the United Nations”, she told the committee on Thursday.

New Caledonia voted by modest majorities to remain part of France in referendums held in 2018 and 2020 under a UN-mandated decolonisation process. Three referendums were part of the Nouméa Accord to increase Kanaks’ political power following deadly violence in the 1980s.

A contentious final referendum in 2021 was overwhelmingly in favor of continuing with the status quo. Supporters of independence rejected its legitimacy due to a very low turnout — it was boycotted by Kanak political parties — and because it was held during a serious phase of the covid-19 pandemic, which restricted campaigning.

“France, through the referendum of September [2021], has therefore completed the process of decolonisation of its former colonies,” ambassador Rome said. She added that New Caledonia was one of the most advanced examples of the French government recognising indigenous rights, with a shared governance framework.

Another of its Pacific territories — French Polynesia — was re-inscribed on the UN decolonisation list in 2013 but France refuses to recognise its jurisdiction.

No change in policy
After a decade, France began attending General Assembly Decolonisation Committee meetings in 2023 to “promote dialogue” and that it was not a “change in [policy] direction”, Rome said.

“There is no process between the French state and the Polynesian territory that reserves a role for the United Nations,” she added.

Santos Pais responded saying, “what a cold shower”.

“The General Assembly will certainly have a completely different view from the one that was presented to us,” he said.

Earlier this month pro-independence French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson told the UN Decolonisation Committee’s annual meeting in New York that “after a decade of silence” France must be “guided” to participate in “dialogue.”

The Human Rights Committee is due to meet again next month to adopt its findings on France.

Copyright ©2015-2024, BenarNews. Republished with the permission of BenarNews.

Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka has “cleared the air” with the Fijian diaspora in Samoa over Fiji’s vote against the United Nations resolution on the Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and People.

He denied that Fiji — the only country to vote against the resolution — had “pressed the wrong button”.

And he described last week’s vote as an “ambush resolution”, claiming it was not the one they had agreed on during the voting of the UN Special Committee of Decolonisation, reports The Fiji Times.

• READ MORE: Rabuka’s message to free Kanaky movement: ‘Don’t slap the hand that feeds you’
• ‘We’ll be talking about the future of negotiations’, says Rabuka on New Caledonia mission
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports
• Other CHOGM reports

However, a prominent Fiji civil society and human rights advocate condemned his statement and also Fiji’s UN voting.

Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre (FWCC) coordinator Shamima Ali said she was “ashamed” of Fiji’s stance over genocide in Palestine, its vote against ceasefire and “not wanting decolonisation”.

In Apia, Rabuka, who leaves for Kanaky New Caledonia on Sunday to take part in the Pacific Islands Forum’s “Troika Plus” talks on the French Pacific’s territory amid indigenous demands for independence, told The Fiji Times:

“We will not tell them we pressed the wrong button. We will tell them that the resolution was an ambush resolution, it is not something that we have been talking about.”

‘Serious student of colonisation’
The Prime Minister said he had been a “serious student of colonisation and decolonisation”.

“They started with the C-12, but now it’s C-24 members of the [UN] committee that talks about decolonisation.

“I was wondering if anyone would complain about my going [to Kanaky New Caledonia] next week because C-24 met last week and there was a vote on decolonisation.”

According to an RNZ Pacific interview, Rabuka had told the Kanak independence movement:”Don’t slap the hand that has fed you.”

Fiji was the only country that voted against the UN resolution while 99 voted for the resolution and 61 countries, including colonisers such as France, United Kingdom and the United States, abstained.

Another coloniser, Indonesia (West Papua), voted for it.

“I thought the [indigenous] people of the Kanaky of New Caledonia would object to my coming, so far we have not heard anything from them.

“So, I am hoping that no one will bring that up, but if they do bring it up, we have a perfect answer.”

Human rights advocate Shamima Ali said in a statement on social media it was “unbelievable” that Prime Minister Rabuka claimed to be “a serious student of colonisation and decolonisation” while leading a government that had been “blatantly complicit in the genocide of innocent Palestinians”.

“No amount of public statements and explanations will save this Coalition government from the mess it has created on the international stage, especially at the United Nations.

“We are ashamed of having a government that supports an occupation, votes against a ceasefire and does not want decolonisation in the world.

“Trust between the Fijian people and their government is being eroded, especially on matters of global significance that reflect on the entire nation.”

According to the government, Fiji is one of two Pacific countries which are members of the Special Committee on Decolonisation or C-24 and have been a consistent voice in addressing the issue of decolonisation.

Through the C-24 and the Fourth Committee, Fiji aligns with the positions undertaken by the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) and the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), in its support for the annual resolution on decolonisation entitled “Implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples”.

Government reiterated its support of the regional position of the Forum, and the MSG on decolonisation and self-determination, as enshrined in the UN Charter.

The Fiji Permanent Mission in New York, led by Filipo Tarakinikini, is working with the Forum Secretariat to clarify the matter within its process.

Rabuka is currently in Samoa for the 2024 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), which is being held in the Pacific for the first time.

French Polynesia’s president and civil society leaders have called on the United Nations to bring France to the negotiating table and set a timetable for the decolonisation of the Pacific territory.

More than a decade after the archipelago was re-listed for decolonisation by the UN General Assembly, France has refused to acknowledge the world’s peak diplomatic organisation has a legitimate role.

France’s reputation has taken a battering as an out-of-touch colonial power since deadly violence erupted in Kanaky New Caledonia in May, sparked by a now abandoned French government attempt to dilute the voting power of indigenous Kanak people.

• READ MORE: Other Māohi Nui independence reports

Pro-independence French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson told the UN Decolonisation Committee’s annual meeting in New York on Monday that “after a decade of silence” France must be “guided” to participate in “dialogue.”

“Our government’s full support for a comprehensive, transparent and peaceful decolonisation process with France, under the scrutiny of the United Nations, can pave the way for a decolonisation process that serves as an example to the world,” Brotherson said.

Brotherson called for France to finally co-operate in creating a roadmap and timeline for the decolonisation process, pointing to unrest in New Caledonia that “reminds us of the delicate balance that peace requires”.

‘Problem with decolonisation’
In August, he warned France “always had a problem with decolonisation” in the Pacific, where it also controls the territories of New Caledonia and Wallis and Futuna.

The 121 islands of French Polynesia stretch over a vast expanse of the Pacific, with a population of about 280,000, and was first settled more than 2000 years ago.

Often referred to as Tahiti after the island with the biggest population, France declared the archipelago a protectorate in 1842, followed by full annexation in 1880.

France last year attended the UN committee for the first time since the territory’s re-inscription in 2013 as awaiting decolonisation, after decades of campaigning by French Polynesian politicians.

“I would like to clarify once again that this change of method does not imply a change of policy,” French permanent representative to the UN Nicolas De Rivière told the committee on Monday.

“There is no process between the state and the Polynesian territory that reserves a role for the United Nations,” he said, and pointed out France contributes almost 2 billion euros (US $2.2 billion) each year, or almost 30 percent of the territory’s GDP.

After the UN session, Brotherson told the media that France’s position is “off the mark”.

17 speakers back independence
French Polynesia was initially listed for decolonisation by the UN in 1946 but removed a year later as France fought to hold onto its overseas territories after the Second World War.

Granted limited autonomy in 1984, with control over local government services, France retained administration over justice, security, defence, foreign policy and the currency.

Seventeen pro-independence and four pro-autonomy – who support the status quo – speakers gave impassioned testimony to the committee.

Lawyer and Protestant church spokesman Philippe Neuffer highlighted children in the territory “solely learn French and Western history”.

“They deserve the right to learn our complete history, not the one centred on the French side of the story,” he said.

“Talking about the nuclear tests without even mentioning our veterans’ history and how they fought to get a court to condemn France for poisoning people with nuclear radiation.”

France conducted 193 nuclear tests over three decades until 1996 in French Polynesia.

‘We demand justice’
“Our lands are contaminated, our health compromised and our spirits burned,” president of the Mururoa E Tatou Association Tevaerai Puarai told the UN denouncing it as French “nuclear colonialism”.

“We demand justice. We demand freedom,” Puarai said.

He said France needed to take full responsibility for its “nuclear crimes”, referencing a controversial 10-year compensation deal reached in 2009.

Some Māʼohi indigenous people, many French residents and descendants in the territory fear independence and the resulting loss of subsidies would devastate the local economy and public services.

Pro-autonomy local Assembly member Tepuaraurii Teriitahi told the committee, “French Polynesia is neither oppressed nor exploited by France.”

“The idea that we could find 2 billion a year to replace this contribution on our own is an illusion that would lead to the impoverishment and downfall of our hitherto prosperous country,” she said.

Copyright ©2015-2024, BenarNews. Republished with the permission of BenarNews.

West Papuan independence advocate Octovianus Mote is in Aotearoa New Zealand to win support for independence for West Papua, which has been ruled by Indonesia for more than 60 years.

Mote is vice-president of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) and is being hosted in New Zealand by the Green Party, which Mote said had always been a “hero” for West Papua.

He spoke at a West Papua seminar at the Māngere Mountain Education Centre tonight.

• WATCH: Michael Cugley‘s video report on Te Ao Māori News
• READ: Other West Papua reports

Former ULMWP president Benny Wenda has alleged more than 500,000 Papuans have been killed since the occupation, and millions of hectares of ancestral forests, rivers and mountains have been destroyed or polluted for “corporate profit”.

Current president is Manasa Tabuni.

The struggle for West Papuans
“Being born a West Papuan, you are already an enemy of the nation [Indonesia],” Mote says.

“The greatest challenge we are facing right now is that we are facing the colonial power who lives next to us.”

If West Papuans spoke up about what was happening, they were considered “separatists”, Mote says, regardless of whether they are journalists, intellectuals, public servants or even high-ranking Indonesian generals.

“When our students on the ground speak of justice, they’re beaten up, put in jail and [the Indonesians] kill so many of them,” Mote says.

Mote is a former journalist and says that while he was working he witnessed Indonesian forces openly fire at students who were peacefully demonstrating their rights.

“We are in a very dangerous situation right now. When our people try to defend their land, the Indonesian government ignores them and they just take the land without recognising we are landowners,” he says.

The ‘ecocide’ of West Papua
The ecology in West Papua is being damaged by mining, deforestation, and oil and gas extraction. Mote says Indonesia wants to “wipe them from the land and control their natural resources”.

He says he is trying to educate the world that defending West Papua means defending the world, especially small islands in the Pacific.

West Papua is the western half of the island of New Guinea, bordering the independent nation of Papua New Guinea. New Guinea has the world’s third-largest rainforest after the Amazon and Congo and it is crucial for climate change mitigation as they sequester and store carbon.

Mote says the continued deforestation of New Guinea, which West Papuan leaders are trying to stop, would greatly impact on the small island countries in the Pacific, which are among the most vulnerable to climate change.

Mote also says their customary council in West Papua has already considered the impacts of climate change on small island nations and, given West Papua’s abundance of land the council says that by having sovereignty they would be able to both protect the land and support Pacific Islanders who need to migrate from their home islands.

In 2021, West Papuan leaders pledged to make ecocide a serious crime and this week Vanuatu, Fiji and Samoa submitted a court proposal to the International Criminal Court (ICJ) to recognise ecocide as a crime.

Support from local Indonesians
Mote says there are Indonesians who support the indigenous rights movement for West Papuans. He says there are both NGOs and a Papuan Peace Network founded by West Papuan peace campaigner Neles Tebay.

“There is a movement growing among the academics and among the well-educated people who have read the realities among those who are also victims of the capitalist investors, especially in Indonesia when they introduced the Omnibus Law.”

The so-called Omnibus Law was passed in 2020 as part of outgoing President Joko Widodo’s goals to increase investment and industrialisation in Indonesia. The law was protested against because of concerns it would be harmful for workers due to changes in working conditions, and the environment because it would allow for increased deforestation.

Mote says there has been an “awakening”, especially among the younger generations who are more open-minded and connected to the world, who could see it both as a humanitarian and an environmental issue.

The ‘transfer’ of West Papua to Indonesia
“The [former colonial nation] Dutch [traded] us like a cow,” Mote says.

The former Dutch colony was passed over to Indonesia in 1963 in disputed circumstances but the ULMWP calls it an “invasion”.

From 1957, the Soviet Union had been supplying arms to Indonesia and, during that period, the Indonesian Communist Party had become the largest political party in the country.

The US government urged the Dutch government to give West Papua to Indonesia in an attempt to appease the communist-friendly Indonesian government as part of a US drive to stop the spread of communism in Southeast Asia.

The US engineered a meeting between both countries, which resulted in the New York Agreement, giving control of West Papua to the UN in 1962 and then Indonesia a year later.

The New York Agreement stipulated that the population of West Papua would be entitled to an act of self-determination.

The ‘act of no choice’
This decolonisation agreement was titled the 1969 Act of Free Choice, which is referred to as “the act of no choice” by pro-independence activists.

Mote says they witnessed “how the UN allowed Indonesia to cut us into pieces, and they didn’t say anything when Indonesia manipulated our right to self-determination”.

The manipulation Mote refers to is for the Act of Free Choice. Instead of a national referendum, the Indonesian military hand-picked 1025 West Papuan “representatives” to vote on behalf of the 816,000 people. The representatives were allegedly threatened, bribed and some were held at gunpoint to ensure a unanimous vote.

Leaders of the West Papuan independence movement assert that this was not a real opportunity to exercise self-determination as it was manipulated. However, it was accepted by the UN.

Pacific support at UN General Assembly
Mote has came to Aotearoa after the 53rd Pacific Island Forum Leaders summit in Tonga last week and he has come to discuss plans over the next five years. Mote hopes to gain support to take what he calls the “slow-motion genocide” of West Papua back to the UN General Assembly.

“In that meeting we formulated how we can help really push self-determination as the main issue in the Pacific Islands,” Mote says.

Mote says there was a focus on self-determination of West Papua, Kanaky/New Caledonia and Tahiti. He also said the focus was on what he described as the current colonisation issue with capitalists and global powers having vested interests in the Pacific region.

The movement got it to the UN General Assembly in 2018, so Mote says it is achievable. In 2018, Pacific solidarity was shown as the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu and the Republic of Vanuatu all spoke out in support of West Papua.

They affirmed the need for the matter to be returned to the United Nations, and the Solomon Islands voiced its concerns over human rights abuses and violations.

What needs to be done
He says that in the next five years Pacific nations need to firstly make the Indonesian government accountable for its actions in West Papua. He also says outgoing President Widodo should be held accountable for his “involvement”.

Mote says New Zealand is the strongest Pacific nation that would be able to push for the human rights and environmental issues happening, especially as he alleges Australia always backs Indonesian policies.

He says he is looking to New Zealand to speak up about the atrocities taking place in West Papua and is particularly looking for support from the Greens, Labour and Te Pāti Māori for political support.

The coalition government announced a plan of action on July 30 this year, which set a new goal of $6 billion in annual two-way trade with Indonesia by 2029.

“New Zealand is strongly committed to our partnership with Indonesia,” Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said at the time.

“There is much more we can and should be doing together.”

Te Aniwaniwa Paterson is a digital producer for Te Ao Māori News. Republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.

As New Caledonia passes the one-month mark since violent and deadly clashes erupted on last month, there has been no clear path put forward by Paris as far as the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) is concerned.

Eight people — including the leader of the Field Action Coordinating Cell (CCAT) Christian Téin — were arrested yesterday by New Caledonia’s security forces over the unrest since May 13.

According to the Public Prosecutor’s office, they face several potential charges, including organised destruction of goods and property and incitement of crimes and murders or murder attempts on officers entrusted with public authority.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Listen to the people that were harassed in their houses” – French Ambassador to the Pacific Véronique Roger-Lacan
• New Caledonia police arrest pro-independence leader among 11 people over deadly protests – Al Jazeera
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“All the unrest, all the troubles, is the result of the ignorance of the French government,” said New Caledonia territorial government spokesperson Charles Wea.

“We cannot have peace without the independence of the country. New Caledonia will always get into trouble if the case of independence is not taken into consideration,” he said.

But speaking in an exclusive interview with RNZ Pacific, the French Ambassador to the Pacific, Véronique Roger-Lacan, said there were options to resolve the ongoing conflict — but the violence needed to stop first.

Roger-Lacan said there was a national process to address the independence issue — that was through the controversial constitutional changes which has sparked the unrest.

Paris is also engaged with the UN Committee on Decolonisation (C24) where options of self-determination through independence or free association with an independent state are being discussed.

On top of that, Paris has met with the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) heads, or troika, over the phone and said talks are underway to either organise a meeting with regional leaders soon, or at the PIF leaders meeting in Tonga in August.

Whatever the option, the FLNKS and the wider pro-independence movement want a robust process that leads to independence, said Wea.

Roger-Lacan said the forces were needed and she rejected claims that the territory was being “militarised”.

She stressed that the thousands of special forces deployed were “necessary” to contain the violence and restore law and order.

Territorial Route 1 has been blocked by barricades erected by the rioters, and Roger-Lacan posed the question: “How do you remove this type of barricade if you have no forces?”

They have called for the immediate withdrawal of the extra forces and a phasing down of security options.

Pacific Conference of Churches general secretary Reverend James Bhagwan told RNZ Pacific France’s heavy deployment of security forces looked like militarisation to him.

“We have seen far too much already these last few weeks to be fooled,” he said.

“We still have militias who are armed, we still have increasing numbers of security forces on the ground. That is militarisation whether it is formal or something that’s been organised in a different way.

“We are just calling it as we see it.

“We’ve also seen the way in which the French government treats that particular area, recognising that this is part of maintaining their colonies as part of the Indo-Pacific strategy, that there is a militarisation movement happening by the French in the Pacific.”

‘Get their facts right’
However, Ambassador Roger-Lacan vehemently disagrees with such claims, saying individuals such as Reverend Bhagwan need to “get their facts right”.

She said claims that the French state had militarised New Caledonia and the region, must be corrected because “it’s not true”.

“First of all, violence had to be stopped, and public order and law enforcement had to be resumed,” she said.

“I would like to suggest for those people [civil society] to watch the houses that were burnt, to listen to the people that were harassed in their houses, to listen to people who were scared of the violence.”

She said such comments were biased, doubling down that “reinforcement was needed”.

Intergenerational trauma
The French Ambassador to the Pacific said concerns that the death toll from the unrest was much higher than reported was also not true.

The death toll stands at eight, she said, adding that three state security officers and five civilians had died.

But some indigenous Kanaks have called for Paris to investigate the death toll, as they believe more young rioters were feared dead.

Roger-Lacan wants worried parents to know France had heard them and concerned parents could call the 24/7 hotline.

“With gendarmes in New Caledonia everywhere, they know all the families, they know all the tribes,” she said.

“It is not true that we don’t have the appropriate links with the whole population.”

Reverend Bhagwan believes it is naive to expect communities to simply trust France given the political history of the territory.

He said there was “intergenerational trauma” simmering under the surface, especially when Kanaks see French forces on their land.

“You can understand then why mothers are concerned about their children, and so to ignore that intergenerational trauma for people in Kanaky, is really a little bit of naivety on the French High Commissioner’s part,” Reverend Bhagwan said.

But one thing all parties agree on is that “force” is not the answer to solve the current crisis.

“Of course, force is not the answer,” Ambassador Roger-Lacan said, but added “force has to be used to bring back public order sometimes”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Fiji and Papua New Guinea have urged the UN’s Decolonisation Committee to expedite a visit to the French-controlled Pacific territory of Kanaky New Caledonia following its pro-independence riots last month.

Nine people have died, dozens were injured and businesses were torched during unrest in the capital Noumea triggered by the French government’s move to dilute the voting power of New Caledonia’s indigenous Kanak people.

Fiji’s permanent representative to the UN, Filipo Tarakinikini, whose statement was also on behalf of Papua New Guinea, spoke yesterday of the two countries’ “serious concern” at the disproportionate number of Kanaks who had lost their lives since the onset of the crisis.

• READ MORE: Pacific churches call at UN for France to drop ‘limbo law’ to restore peace in Kanaky
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• France’s snap election: what happened, why, and what’s next?
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“We underscore that New Caledonia can best be described as a fork in the road situation,” Tarakinikini told the committee session at UN headquarters in New York.

“History is replete with good lessons,” he said, “to navigate such situations toward peaceful resolution. Today we have heard yet again loud and clear what colonisation does to a people.”

Tarakinikini said Fiji and Papua New Guinea want the UN’s Special Committee on Decolonisation to send a visiting mission to New Caledonia as soon as possible to get first-hand knowledge of the situation.

He also criticised militarisation of the island after France sent hundreds of police and troops with armoured personnel carriers to restore order. Unrest has continued despite the security reinforcements.

‘Taking up arms no solution’
“Taking up arms against each other is not the solution, nor is the militarisation and fortification by authorities in the territory the correct signal in our Blue Pacific continent,” Tarakinikini said.

New Caledonia’s international airport remains closed, preventing pro-independence President Louis Mapou and other representatives from traveling to the UN committee.

Rioting is estimated by the local chamber of commerce to have caused US$200 million in economic damage, with 7000 jobs lost.

The decolonisation committee was established by the UN General Assembly in 1961 to monitor implementation of the international commitment to granting independence to colonised peoples. Today, some 17 territories, home to 2 million people and mostly part of the former British empire, are under its purview.

Fiji and Papua New Guinea are both long-term committee members, which has listed New Caledonia as a UN non-self-governing territory under French administration since 1986.

In the Pacific, American Samoa, French Polynesia, Guam, Pitcairn and Tokelau also remain on the list.

Representatives of civil society organisations who spoke to the committee criticised France’s control of New Caledonia and blamed it for triggering the crisis.

Loyalists talk of ‘coup’
Loyalists who made submissions likened the riots to a coup and a deliberate sabotage of what they said was the previous consensus between Kanaks and French immigrants, “forcing those who do not adhere to the independence project to leave.”

France’s statement to the meeting appeared to blame outside forces for fomenting unrest.

“Certain external actors, far from the region, seek to fuel tensions through campaigns to manipulate information,” the country’s delegate said, adding the European country would “continue its cooperation with the UN, including during this key period.”

French National Assembly member from French Guiana Jean Victor Castor warned the country had entered a “new phase of colonial repression.”

Castor also called on the U.N. to send a mission to “encourage France to respect its commitments and pursue the path of concerted decolonisation, the only guarantee of a return to peace.”

French control of New Caledonia gives the European nation a significant security and diplomatic role in the Pacific at a time when the US, Australia and other Western countries are pushing back against China’s inroads in the region.

New Caledonia, home to about 270,000 people, also has valuable nickel deposits that are among the world’s largest.

Unrest worst since 1980s
The unrest was the worst political violence in the Pacific territory since the 1980s. The riots erupted on May 12 as the lower house of France’s National Assembly debated and subsequently approved a constitutional amendment to unfreeze New Caledonia’s electoral roll, which would give the vote to thousands of French immigrants.

Final approval of the amendment requires a joint sitting of France’s lower house and Senate.

On Wednesday, French President Emmanuel Macron said such efforts should be suspended following his call earlier this week for a snap general election in France, Agence France-Presse reports.

“I have decided to suspend it, because we can’t leave things ambiguous in this period,” Macron said, according to the international news service.

Referendums held in 2018 and 2020 under the UN-mandated decolonisation process produced modest majorities in favor of remaining part of France.

Less than half of New Caledonians voted in the third and final referendum in 2021 that overwhelmingly backed staying part of France.

The vote was boycotted by the Kanak independence movement after it was brought forward without consultation by the French government during a serious phase of the covid-19 pandemic, which restricted campaigning.

Mareva Lechat-Kitalong, Delegate for International, European and Pacific Affairs of French Polynesia, told the committee what happened with New Caledonia’s third referendum should “not happen again for a question so fundamental as independence or not.”

She also urged France to commit to a roadmap for French Polynesia that “fully supports a proper decolonisation process and self-determination process under the scrutiny of the United Nations.”

Copyright ©2015-2024, BenarNews. Republished with the permission of BenarNews.

The Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC) has called on France to drop the “limbo” proposed law on electoral changes in Kanaky New Caledonia opposed by the indigenous pro-independence movement and restore the path to peace and self-determination.

General secretary Reverend James Bhagwan made the call at the UN Committee of 24 meeting in New York as the future of the draft law, which has already been passed decisively by the Senate and National Assembly but not ratified by the combined legislative Council, looked doubtful as a result of French President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to call a snap election.

Incomplete legislation is reportedly deemed as suspended once a general election is called.

• READ MORE: Kanaky New Caledonia unrest: What happens to limbo law change with French snap election?
• History ‘replaying itself’ in Kanaky but Pacific solidarity growing, says Tau
• France’s snap election: what happened, why, and what’s next?
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• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

Reverend Bhagwan referred to his role as a petitioner at C24 in June 2022 when he spoke on behalf of Pacific faith and civil society organisations against the move by the French government to “fast track” legislative changes that would dilute the vote of the indigenous Kanaks, already a minority 41 percent of the 270,000 New Caledonian population.

Criticising France for having turned a “deaf ear” to the “untiring and peaceful calls of the indigenous people for a new political process following the 1998 Nouméa Accord, Reverend Bhagwan said Paris had not upheld “one of the most fundamental principles of the United Nations Charter — the fundamental right of all peoples to be free, free from colonial rule”.

in his group statement on the “Question of New Caledonia” to the “Special Committee on the Situation with regard to the implementation of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence of Colonial Countries and Peoples” at the UN, he said:

The chair, members of this august committee, petitioners and observers.

Greetings from the Pasifika Household of God. May the grace and peace of God be upon you all.

In June, 2022, I was here as a petitioner on behalf of faith and civil society organisations of our Pacific region, home to the French colonised territories of Kanaky New Caledonia and Mā’ohi Nui French Polynesia, to raise our concerns on the failure of the referendum process.

In Kanaky, under the Nouméa Accord, through the actions of the French government to fast track the third referendum, despite local, regional and global pleas.

In the two years since, France has taken further actions that contradict its responsibilities as an administrating power, to uphold one of the most fundamental principles of the United Nations Charter — the fundamental right of all peoples to be free, free from colonial rule.

France has turned a deaf ear to untiring and peaceful calls of the indigenous people of Kanaky-New Caledonia and other pro-independence supporters for a new political process, founded on justice, peaceful dialogue and consensus and has demonstrated a continued inability and unwillingness to remain a neutral and trustworthy party under the Nouméa Accord.

Today, on behalf of Pacific Churches and Civil Society we reiterate our collective concerns that we have made in a number of statements on the current situation in Kanaky.

Recalling these statements and on behalf of the Église Protestante de Kanaky Nouvelle-Calédonie, and the Pacific Regional Non-Governmental Organisation Alliance, the Pacific Conference of Churches calls:

1. For the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of the draft constitutional law seeking to unfreeze the local electorate roll. Noting that the Presidents of four other French overseas territories have called for the withdrawal of the voting changes;
2. On the French Government to reconsider, as an essential step to de-escalating tensions in the territory, any further deployment of armed forces to Kanaky;
3. On the French Presidency to cease any further attempts to enforce externally designed and controlled pathways to determine the political future of Kanaky, including a possible referendum in France to unfreeze the territory’s electorate roll;
4. On other parties to the Noumea Accord to heed the repeated and non-violent requests of the FLNKS and other pro-independence voices, over the last 2-3 years, to allow more conducive conditions for dialogue and negotiation for a better political agreement, and to give the process all the time necessary to do so;
5. For the Pacific Islands Forum to establish an Eminent Persons Group, comprising of French, Pacific Islands and international personalities, in collaboration with the C24, as a matter of urgency to mediate between the parties and ensure the best conditions to enable a just and peaceful dialogue process for the territory’s political future; and finally,
6. Beyond the political dialogue process, commitments to be made and kept for culturally appropriate community trauma healing for all communities in Kanaky and for community dialogue processes, particularly between Kanak and Caldoche for peacebuilding as well as nation building.

The very fact that Kanaky New Caledonia is an agenda item in this meeting and that of the 24th Committee is a reminder that their decolonisation is a matter of ‘WHEN’, not ‘if’ — and a ‘when’ that needs to be sooner rather than later.

May God’s blessings of justice, love and liberation be with all the people of Kanaky as they seek their own equality, liberty and fraternity.

Oleti Atrqatr (Thank you in the Kanak Drehu dialect).

Presented by
Reverend James Shri Bhagwan
General Secretary
Pacific Conference of Churches

French president Emmanuel Macron has landed in Nouméa.

The French Ambassador to the Pacific Véronique Roger-Lacan was on the flight.

“The unrest in New Caledonia is absolutely unacceptable,” Roger-Lacan told RNZ Pacific in an interview.

• READ MORE: Liberation for New Caledonia’s Kanak people ‘must come’, says media educator — Audio
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She had just arrived back from Caracas where she represented France at this week’s United Nations seminar on decolonisation.

“As far as the French state is concerned, our door is open, we are welcoming everyone for dialogue, in Paris or in Nouméa. It’s up to everyone to join further dialogue,” Roger-Lacan said.

Roger-Lacan said the unrest had been provoked by very specific parts of the New Caledonian establishment.

She said she made a plea for dialogue at the United Nations decolonisation seminar in light of the deadly protests in New Caledonia.

‘Up to all the parties’
“Well, what I want to say is that the Nouméa agreement has enabled everyone in New Caledonia to have a representation in the French National Assembly and in the Senate,” Roger-Lacan said.

“And it is up to all the parties, including the independantistes, who have some representatives in the National Assembly and in the Senate, to use their political power to convince everyone in the National Assembly and in the Parliament.

“If they don’t manage [this], it is [an] amazingly unacceptable way of voicing their concerns through violence.”

While the French government and anti-independence leaders maintain protest organisers are to blame for the violence, pro-independence parties say they have been holding peaceful protests for months.

They say violence was born from socio-economic disparities and France turning a deaf ear to the territorial government’s call for a controversial proposed constitutional electoral amendment to be scrapped.

Roger-Lacan said while “everyone” was saying this unrest was called for because they were not listened to by the French state, France stands ready for dialogue.

She said just because one group failed to “use their political power to convince the Assembly and the Senate”, it did not justify deadly protests.

Composition questioned
A long-time journalist reporting on Pacific issues said the composition of the French President’s delegation to New Caledonia would anger pro-independence leaders.

Islands Business correspondent Nic Maclellan said Macron would be accompanied by the current Overseas Minister Gérald Darmanin and Armed Forces Minister Sébastien Lecornu.

“They will no doubt be welcomed by supporters of the French republic, anti-independence politicians who want to stay with France but Lecornu and Darmanin have been responsible for key decisions taken over the last three or four years that have lead to this current crisis,” Maclellan said.

President Macron has said the main objective of the trip is to resume political talks with all stakeholders and find a political solution to the crisis.

United Nations decolonisation
This year Véronique Roger-Lacan represented France at the table at a seminar which took place in the lead up to the UN Committee on Decolonisation in New York in June.

The right to self determination is a constitutional principle in the French constitution as much as it is in the UN Charter, Roger-Lacan explained.

The meeting she has just been at in Caracas, “prepares a draft, UN General Assembly resolution, that is being examined in the committee, which is called the C-24,” she said.

Roger-Lacan was appointed to the role of French ambassador to the Pacific in July last year.

Various groups have been calling for the United Nations to head a delegation to New Caledonia to observe the current situation.

Roger-Lacan said the New Caledonia coalition government representative and the FLNKS representative both called for a UN mission at the meeting.

“Then there were five representatives of the loyalists and they all made the case of the fact that a third referenda had been in compliance with the two UN General Assembly resolutions determining the future status of New Caledonia,” she said.

As the representative of the French state, she made the case that France had always been the only administrative power to sit in the C-24 — “and to negotiate and cooperate,” she said.

“The United States, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom never did that,” Roger-Lacan said.

She also welcomed the UN, “whenever they want to visit”, she said.

“That’s the plea that I made on behalf of the French government, a plea for dialogue.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Liberation “must come” for Kanaky New Caledonia, says one of the few New Zealand journalists who have worked consistently on stories across the French Pacific territories.

Journalist David Robie was arrested at gunpoint by French police in January 1987, and is no stranger to civil unrest in New Caledonia.

Writing his first articles about the Pacific from Paris in 1974 on French nuclear testing when working for Agence France-Presse, Robie became a freelance journalist in the 1980s, working for Radio Australia, Islands Business, The Australian, Pacific Islands Monthly, Radio New Zealand and other media.

• READ MORE: Liberation for New Caledonia’s Kanak people ‘must come’, says media educator — Audio
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The Asia Pacific Report editor, who has been on the case for 50 years now, arrived at his interview with RNZ Pacific with a bag of books packed with images and stories from his days in the field.

“I did get arrested twice [in Kanaky New Caledonia], in fact, but the first time was actually at gunpoint which was slightly unnerving,” Robie explained.

“They accused me of being a spy.”

Liberation ‘must come’
Robie said liberation “must come” for Kanaky New Caledonia.

“It’s really three decades of hard work by a lot of people to build, sort of like a future for New Caledonia, which is part of the Pacific rather than part of France,” Robie said.

He said France has had three Prime Ministers since 2020 and none of them seem to have any “real affinity” for indigenous issues, particularly in the South Pacific, in contrast to some previous leaders.

“From 2020 onwards, basically, France lost the plot,” after Édouard Philippe was in office, Robie said.

He called the current situation a “real tragedy” and believed New Caledonia was now more polarised than ever before.

“France has betrayed the aspirations of the indigenous Kanak people.”

Robie said the whole spirit of the Nouméa Accord was to lead Kanaky towards self determination.

New Caledonia on UN decolonisation list
New Caledonia is listed under the United Nations as a territory to be decolonised — reinstated on 2 December 1986.

“Progress had been made quite well with the first two votes on self determination, the two referendums on independence, where there’s a slightly higher and reducing opposition.”

In 2018, 43.6 percent voted in favour of independence with an 81 percent voter turnout. Two years later 46.7 percent were in favour with a voter turnout of 85.7 percent, but 96.5 percent voted against independence in 2021, with a voter turnout of just 43.8 percent.

Robie labelled the third vote a “complete write off”.

France maintains it was legitimate, despite first insisting on holding the third vote a year earlier than originally scheduled, and in spite of pleas from indigenous Kanak leaders to postpone the vote so they could properly bury and mourn the many members of their communities who died as a result of the covid-19 pandemic.

Robie said France was now taking a deliberate step to “railroad” the indigenous vote in Kanaky New Caledonia.

He said the latest “proposed amendment” to the constitution would give thousands more non-indigenous people voting rights.

“[The new voters would] completely swamp indigenous people,” Robie said.

‘Hope’ and other options
Robie said there “was hope yet”, despite France’s betrayal of the Kanaks over self-determination and independence, especially over the past three years.

French President Emmanuel Macron is under increasing pressure to scrap proposed constitutional reform by Pacific leaders which sparked riots in New Caledonia.

Pacific leaders and civil society groups have affirmed their support for New Caledonia’s path to independence.

Robie backed that call. He said there were options, including an indefinite deferment of the final stage, or Macron could use his presidential veto.

“So [I’m] hopeful that something like that will happen. There certainly has to be some kind of charismatic change to sort out the way things are at the moment.”

“Charismatic change” could be on its way with talk of a dialogue mission.

Having Édouard Philippe — who has always said he had grown a strong bond with New Caledonia when he was in office until 2020 — on the mission would be “a very positive move”, said Robie.

“Because what really is needed now is some kind of consensus,” he said.

‘We don’t want to be like the Māori in NZ’
New Caledonia could still have a constructive “partnership” with France, just like the Cook Islands has with New Zealand, Robie said.

“The only problem is that the French government doesn’t want to listen,” New Caledonia presidential spokesperson Charles Wea said.

“You cannot stop the Kanak people from claiming freedom in their own country.”

Despite the calls, Wea said concerns were setting in that Kanak people would “become a minority in their own country”.

“We [Kanak people] are afraid to be like Māori in New Zealand. We are afraid to be like Aboriginal people in Australia.”

He said those fears were why it was so important the controversial constitutional amendments did not go any further.

Robie said while Kanaks were already a minority in their own country, there had been a pretty close parity under the Nouméa Accord.

Vote a ‘retrograde step’
“Bear in mind, a lot of French people who’ve lived in New Caledonia for a long time, believe in independence as well,” he said.

But it was the “constitutional reform” that was the sticking point, something Robie refused to call a “reform”, describing as “a very retrograde step”.

In 1998, there was “goodwill” though the Nouméa accord.

“The only people who could participate in New Caledonian elections, as opposed to the French state as a whole, were indigenous Kanaks and those who had been living in New Caledonia prior to 1998,” something France brought in at the time.

Robie said a comparison can be drawn “much more with Australia”, rather than Aotearoa New Zealand.

“Kanak people resisting French control a century and a half ago were executed by the guillotine,” he said.

To Robie, Aotearoa was probably the better example of what New Caledonia could be.

“But you have to recall that New Caledonia began colonial life just like Australia, a penal colony,” he said.

Robie explained how Algerian fighters were shipped off to New Caledonia, Vietnamese fighters were also sent during the Vietnam War, among other people from other minority groups.

“A lot of people think it’s French and Kanak. It’s not. It’s a lot more mixed than that and a lot more complicated.”

The media and the blame game
As Robie explained the history, another issue became apparent: the lack of media interest and know-how to cover such events from Aotearoa New Zealand.

He said he had been disappointed to see many mainstream outlets glossing over history and focusing on the stranded Kiwis and fighting, which he said was significant, but needed context.

He said this lack of built-up knowledge within newsrooms and an apparent issue of “can’t be bothered, or it’s too problematic,” was projecting the indigenous population as the bad guys.

“There’s a projection that basically ‘Oh, well, they’re young people… looting and causing fires and that sort of thing’, they don’t get an appreciation of just how absolutely frustrated young people feel. It’s 50 percent of unemployment as a result of the nickel industry collapse, you know,” Robie explained.

When it came to finger pointing, he believed the field activist movement CCAT did not intend for all of this to happen.

“Once the protests reached a level of anger and frustration, all hell broke loose,” said Robie.

“But they [CCAT] have been made the scapegoats.

“Whereas the real culprits are the French government, and particularly the last three prime ministers in my view.”

Dr David Robie’s updated book on the New Caledonia troubles, news media and Pacific decolonisation issues was published in 2014, Don’t Spoil My Beautiful Face: Media, Mayhem and Human Rights in the Pacific (Little Island Press).

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

After 10 years of non-attendance, France turned up to this week’s French Polynesia sitting of the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation (C-24) — but the French delegate did not deliver the message that pro-independence French Polynesian groups wanted to hear.

French Polynesia was re-inscribed to the United Nations (UN) list of non-self-governing territories in 2013.

Pro-independence leader Moetai Brotherson, President of French Polynesia, came to power in May 2023.

• READ MORE: Macron warns of ‘new colonialism’ in Pacific, but clings to French ‘colonies’
• Other France in the Pacific reports

Since then he has claimed he received assurances from French President Emmanuel Macron that France would end its “empty chair” policy regarding UN decolonisation sessions on French Polynesia.

President Macron apparently kept his promise, but the message that the French Ambassador to the UN, Nicolas De Rivière, delivered was unambiguous.

He declared French Polynesia “has no place” on the UN list of non-autonomous territories because “French Polynesia’s history is not the history of New Caledonia”.

The indigenous Kanak peoples of New Caledonia, the other French Pacific dependency currently on the UN list, have actively pursued a pathway to decolonisation through the Noumea Accord and are still deep in negotiations with Paris about their political future.

French public media Polynésie 1ère TV quoted the ambassador as saying: “No process between France and French Polynesia allows a role for the United Nations.”

The ambassador also voiced France’s wish to have French Polynesia withdrawn from the UN list. At the end of his statement, the Ambassador left the room, leaving a junior agent to sit in his place.

This was just as more than 40 pro-independence petitioners were preparing to make their statements.

The C-24 session started on Tuesday morning.

This week, French Polynesia’s 40-plus strong — mostly pro-independence delegation — of petitioners included the now-ruling Tavini Huiraatira party, members of the civil society, the local Māohi Protestant Church, and nuclear veterans associations and members of the local Parliament (the Territorial Assembly) and French Polynesian MPs sitting at the French National Assembly in Paris.

It also included President Moetai Brotherson from Tavini.

French position on decolonisation unchanged
For the past 10 years, since it was re-inscribed on the UN list, French Polynesia has sent delegates to the meeting, with the most regular attendees being from the Tavini Huiraatira party:

“I was angry because the French ambassador left just before our petitioners were about to take the floor [. . . ] I perceived this as a sign of contempt on the part of France,” said Hinamoeura Cross, a petitioner and a pro-independence member of French Polynesia’s Territorial Assembly, reacting this week to the French envoy’s appearance then departure, Polynésie 1ère TV reports.

Since being elected to the top post in May 2023, President Brotherson has stressed that independence, although it remains a long-term goal, is not an immediate priority.

Days after his election, after meeting French President Macron for more than an hour, he said he was convinced there would be a change in France’s posture at the UN C-24 committee hearing and an end to the French “empty chair policy”.

“I think we should put those 10 years of misunderstanding, of denial of dialogue [on the part of France] behind us [. . .]. Everyone can see that since my election, the relations with France have been very good [. . . ]. President Macron and I have had a long discussion about what is happening [at the UN] and the way we see our relations with France evolve,” he told Tahiti Nui Télévision earlier this week from New York.

President ‘for all French Polynesians’ – Brotherson
President Brotherson also stressed that this week, at the UN, he would speak as President of French Polynesia on behalf of “all [French] Polynesians, including those who do not want independence today”.

“So in my speech I will be very careful not to create confusion between me coming here [at the UN] to request the implementation of a self-determination process, and me coming here to demand independence which is beside the point,” he added in the same interview.

He conceded that at the same meeting, delegates from his own Tavini party were likely to deliver punchier, more “militant”, speeches “because this is Tavini’s goal”.

“But as for me, I speak as President of French Polynesia.”

Ahead of the meeting, Tavini Huiraatira pro-independence leader Oscar Temaru said that “It’s the first time a pro-independence President of French Polynesia will speak at the UN (C-24) tribune”.

Temaru, 78, was French Polynesia’s president in 2013 when it was reinscribed to the UN list.

Speaking of the different styles between him and his 54-year-old son-in-law — Moetai Brotherson is married to Temaru’s daughter — Temaru said this week: “He has his own strategy and I have mine and mine has not changed one bit [. . .] this country must absolutely become a sovereign state.

“Can you imagine? Overnight, we would own this country of five million sq km. Today, we have nothing.”

French Minister of Home Affairs and Overseas Gérald Darmanin wrote on the social media platform X, previously Twitter, earlier this week: “On this matter just like on other ones, [France] is working with elected representatives in a constructive spirit and in the respect of the territory’s autonomy and of France’s sovereignty.”

Darmanin has already attended the C-24 meeting when it considered New Caledonia.

The United Nations list of non-self-governing territories currently includes 17 territories world-wide and six of those are located in the Pacific — American Samoa, French Polynesia, Guam, New Caledonia, Pitcairn Island and Tokelau.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) has adopted a “fresh approach” in addressing the longstanding and sensitive West Papuan issue, claims Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare.

Upon his return yesterday from the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York last week, he clarified to local media about why he had left out the West Papuan issue from his discussions at the UN.

“We have agreed during our last MSG meeting in Port Vila not to pursue independence for West Papua,” he said.

• READ MORE: Release of Victor Yeimo from Indonesian prison rekindles West Papuan fight against racism
• Other West Papua reports

“Pursuing independence at the MSG level has historically led to unnecessary human rights violations against the people of West Papua, as it becomes closely linked to the independence movement.”

His statement drew criticism from Opposition Leader Matthew Wale over the “about face” over West Papua, likening Sogavare to the betrayal of “Judas the Iscariot”.

Sogavare highlighted that MSG’s new strategy was involving the initiation of a dialogue with the Indonesian government.

The focus was on treating the people of West Papua as part of Melanesia and urging the government of Indonesia to respect them accordingly.

‘Domestic matter’
“The issue of independence and self-determination is a domestic matter that West Papua needs to address internally,” he said.

“The United Nations (C-24) has established a process allowing them the right to determine their self-determination.”

The United Nations C-24, known as the Special Committee on Decolonisation, was established in 1961 to address decolonisation issues.

This committee, a subsidiary of the UN General Assembly, is dedicated to matters related to granting independence to colonised countries and peoples.

Prime Minister Sogavare’s statements underscore the MSG’s commitment to a diplomatic approach and dialogue with Indonesia, aiming for a respectful and inclusive resolution to the West Papuan issue.

However, Opposition leader Wale expressed his disappointment with Sogavare’s statement on the right to self determination at the UN.

Sogavare had stated that Solomon Islands reaffirmed the right to self-determination as enshrined under the UN Charter.

New Caledonia, Polynesia highlighted
But while New Caledonia and French Polynesia were highlighted, Wale said it was sad that the plight of West Papua had not been included.

The opposition leader said both the FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front) and West Papuans were Melanesian peoples and both desired independence.

He said West Papua had been under very oppressive “schematic and systematic Indonesian colonial rule” — far worse than anything New Caledonia had suffered.

“We are Melanesians and we should always stand hand in hand with our brothers and sisters in West Papua,” he said.

Wale said diplomacy and geopolitics should never cloud “solidarity with our Melanesian people of West Papua”.

The opposition leader said it was sad that Sogavare, who had used to be a strong supporter of the West Papuan cause, had changed face.

‘Changed face’
“The Prime Minister was once a strong supporter of West Papua, a very vocal leader against the human rights atrocities, even at the UNGA and international forums in the past.

“For sure, he has been bought for 30 pieces of silver and has clearly changed face,” Wale said.

He also reiterated his call to MSG leaders to rethink their stand on West Papua.

“The Prime Minister should have maintained Solomon Islands stand on West Papua like he used to,” Wale said.

“Sogavare is no different to Judas the Iscariot.”

Charley Piringi is editor of In-Depth Solomons. Republished with permission.

The Free Papua Organisation (Organisasi Papua Merdeka-OPM) has sent an open letter to the United Nations leadership demanding that “decolonisation” of the former Dutch colony of West New Guinea, the Indonesian-administered region known across the Pacific as West Papua, be initiated under the direction of the UN Trusteeship Council.

The letter accuses the UN of being a “criminal accessory to the plundering of the ancestral lands” of the Papuans, a Melanesian people with affinity and close ties to many Pacific nations.

According to the OPM leader, chairman-commander Jeffrey Bomanak, West Papuans had been living with the expectation for six decades that the UN would “fulfill the obligations regarding the legal decolonisation of West Papua”.

• READ MORE: Author condemns Canberra ‘collusion’ with Jakarta on West Papua atrocities
• OPM’s open letter to the UN
• Other West Papua reports

Alternatively, wrote Bomanak, there had been an expectation that there would be an explanation “to the International Commission of Jurists if there are any legal reasons why these obligations to West Papua cannot be fulfilled”.

The open letter was addressed to UN Secretary-General António Guterres, General Assembly President Csaba Kőrösi and Trusteeship Council President Nathalie Estival-Broadhurst.

Bomanak also accused the UN of “gifting” West Papua and Indonesia and the US mining conglomerate Freepost-McMoRan at Grasberg in 1967.

‘Guilty’ over annexation
“The United Nations is guilty of annexing West New Guinea on Sept 21, 1962, as a trust territory which had been concealed by the UN Secretariat from the Trusteeship Council.”

Indonesia has consistently rejected West Papuan demands for self-determination and independence, claiming that its right to sovereignty over the region stems from the so-called Act of Free Choice in 1969.

But many West Papuans groups and critics across the Pacific and internationally reject the legitimacy of this controversial vote when 1025 elders selected by the Indonesian military were coerced into voting “unanimously” in favour of Indonesian rule.

A sporadic armed struggle by the armed wing of OPM and peaceful lobbying for self-determination and independence by other groups, such as the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP), have continued since then with persistent allegations of human rights violations with the conflict escalating in recent months.

In 2017, the UN’s Decolonisation Committee refused to accept a petition signed by 1.8 million West Papuans calling for independence, saying West Papua’s cause was outside the committee’s mandate.

“The UN is a criminal accessory to the plundering of our ancestral lands and to the armament exports from member nations to our murderers and assassins — the Indonesian government,” claimed Bomanak in his letter.

“West Papua is not a simple humanitarian dilemma. The real dilemma is the perpetual denial of West Papua’s right to freedom and sovereignty.”

Bomanak alleges that the six-decade struggle for independence has cost more than 500,000 lives.

West Papua case ‘unique’
In a supporting media release by Australian author and human rights advocate Jim Aubrey, he said that the open letter should be read “by anyone who supports international laws and governance and justice that are applied fairly to all people”.

“West Papua’s case for the UN to honour the process of decolonisation is a unique one,” he said.

“Former Secretary General U Thant concealed West Papua’s rights as a UN trust territory for political reasons that benefited the Republic of Indonesia and the American mining company Freeport-McMoRan.

“West Papua was invaded and recolonised by Indonesia. The mining giant Freeport-McMoRan signed their contract to build the Mt Grasberg mine with the mass murderer Suharto in 1967.

“The vote of self-determination in 1969 was, for Suharto and his commercial allies, already a foregone conclusion in 1967.”

Aubrey said that West Papuans were still being “jailed, tortured, raped, assassinated [and] bombed in one of the longest ongoing acts of genocide since the end of the Second World War”.

Western countries accused
He accused Australia, European Union, UK, USA as well as the UN of being “accessories to Indonesia’s illegal invasion and landgrab”.

About Australia’s alleged role, Aubrey said he had called for a Royal Commission to investigate but had not received a reply from Governor-General David Hurley or from Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus.

PRESS RELEASE

OFFICIAL OPM Press Release 14 September 2023
OPM LEADER ACCUSES UN OF GIFTING WEST PAPUA TO INDONESIA & US MINER FREEPORT-MCMORAN – DEMANDS DECOLONIZATION

Jeffrey P Bomanak accuses United Nations Secretary General António Guterres, General Assembly President Csaba… pic.twitter.com/gggZl3wLyc

— Lewis Prai : West Papuan Diplomat (@PapuaWeb) September 14, 2023

The name Vanuatu has taken on a sacred significance in Papuan liberation consciousness.

The Free Papua Movement (OPM) elders ignited this consciousness after the declaration of West Papua’s independence on 1 July 1971.

The declaration was an act of revolution to reclaim Papuan sovereignty, stolen by Indonesia.

• READ MORE: ULMWP welcomes Vanuatu leader’s ‘Melanesian way’ vow in Jakarta
• West Papua wins observer status in MSG
• Other West Papua reports

General Seth Rumkorem and Jacob Prai declared it, defended it, and received official recognition. Dakar, Senegal, was among them, the first international diplomatic office opened by OPM shortly after the declaration.

As Papuans resisted the invasion, they sought refuge in the Netherlands, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, Sweden, Australia, and Greece. All joined, at least in spirit, under the name OPM.

Its spirit of revolution that bonded West Papua and Vanuatu with those across Europe, Oceania, and Africa. This was a time of decolonisation, revolution, and a Cold War.

The decolonisation movement back then was more conscious in heart and mind of humanity than now.

Rex Rumakiek’s ‘sacred connection’
Rex Rumakiek (now aged 78), a long time OPM fighter alongside others, established this sacred connection in 1978.

In Papua New Guinea, Rumakiek met with students from Vanuatu studying at the University of Papua New Guinea and shared the OPM’s revolutionary victory, tragedy, and solution.

These students later took prominent roles in the formation of the independent state of Vanuatu — became part of the solution — laid a foundation of hope.

A common spirit emerged between the OPM’s resistance to Indonesian colonisation and Vanuatu’s struggle for freedom from long-term European (French and English) confederation rule.

A brutal system of dual rule known as Condominium — critics called it “Pandemonium” (chaos and disorder).

West Papua, a land known as “little heaven” is indeed like a Garden of Eden in Milton’s epic Paradise Lost poem.

To restore freedom and justice to that betrayed, lost paradise was the foundation of Vanuatu and West Papua’s relationship. For more than 40 years Vanuatu has been a beacon of hope.

Deep connections
Both shared deep religious metaphysical, cultural, and political connections.

On a metaphysical level, Vanuatu became a place of hope and redemption. Apart from supporting the West Papua freedom fighters, Vanuatu played a critical role in the reconciliation of Papuans who split off in various directions due to internal conflicts over numerous issues, including ideologies and strategies.

A tragedy of internal disputes and conflicts that placed a long-lasting strain on their collective war against Indonesian occupation.

This can be seen from Vanuatu’s decades-long effort to invite two key leaders of the West Papuan Provisional Parliament — General Seth Rumkorem and Jacob Prai.

In 2011, Peter King, Jim Elmslie and Camellia Webb-Gannon’s paper “Comprehending West Papua” wrote:

In 1985, Vanuatu brought the two conflicting leaders of OPM, Mr. Jacob Prai and Gen. Seth Rumkorem, to Vanuatu and ended their differences so that they could work together (p. 217).

In 2000, Vanuatu invited the OPM leaders and Papua’s Presidium Council (PDP) to sign a memorandum of understanding. The year 2008 was also a year of reconciliation, which led to the formation of the West Papua Nation Coalition of Liberation (WPNCL).

In 2014, there was another big reconciliation summit in Port Vila, which led to the formation of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP).

Melanesian identity
Culturally, Vanuatu and West Papua share a deep sense of Melanesian identity — a common bond from shared experiences of colonisation, racism, mistreatment, dehumanisation, and slavery.

This bond, however, is strengthened far beyond these European and Indonesian atrocities as Barak Sope, one of Melanesia’s key thinkers and prominent supporters of West Papua put it in 2017, Papuans and Vanuatu and all Melanesians in Oceania have deep ancient roots. There are deep Melanesian links that connect our ancestors. Europeans came and destroyed that connection by rewriting our history because they had the power of written language, and we did not.

Our connections were recorded in myths, legends, songs, dances, and culture. It is our duty now to revive that ancient link (Conversation with Yamin Kogoya in Port Vila, December 2017).

Politically, Vanuatu and West Papua also share a common sense of resistance to both European and Indonesian colonisations.

Father Walter Lini, founder of Vanuatu and MSG, later became Prime Minister. Following its renaming as the Vanua’aku Pati in 1974, Lini’s party pushed hard for independence — the Republic of Vanuatu was formally established in 1980.

The OPM and Black Brothers helped shape this new nation and were part of a force that created a pan-Melanesian identity through music.

“Vanuatu will not be completely free until all Melanesia is free from colonialism” is Walter Lini’s famous saying, which has been used by West Papua and New Caledonian Kanaks in their struggle for liberation against Indonesian and French colonisation.

A just world
During this long journey, a profound bond and sense of connection and a shared cause, and destiny for a just world was born between Vanuatu and West Papua and the greater Oceania. A kind of Messianic hope developed with name Vanuatu that Papuans a hope that deliverance would come from Vanuatu.

Papuans can only express their gratitude in social media through their artistic works and heartfelt thanksgiving messages.

Ahead of the upcoming MSG summit, the Free West Papua Campaign Facebook page has posted the following image showing a Papuan with Morning Star clothing crossing a cliff on the back of a larger and taller figure representing Vanuatu.

In politics, it is all about diplomacy, networks, and cooperation, as the famous PNG politicians’ mantra in their foreign policy, “Friend to all and enemy to none.” This is such an ironic and tragic position to be in when half of PNG’s country men are “going extinct”, and they know how and why?

Sometimes the only solution is to confront such an evil head on when/if innocent lives are at risk. The notion of being friends with everyone and enemies with nobody has no virtue, value, substance, or essence.

In the real-world, humans have friends and enemies. The only question is, we must not only choose between friends and foes but also understand the difference between them.

No human, whether realist, idealist, traditionalist, or transcendentalist, who sincerely believes, can make a neutral virtue less stand — where right and wrong are neither right nor wrong at the same time. Human agents must make choices. Being able to choose and know the difference and reasons why, is what makes us human — this is where value is contested, for and against.

Stand up for something
In the current world climate, someone must stand up for something — for the oppressed, for the marginalised, the abused, the persecuted, the land, for the planet and for humanity.

This tiny island country, Vanuatu has exhibited that warrior spirit for many years. In March, Vanuatu spearheaded a UN resolution on climate change. Nina Lakhani in The Guardian wrote:

“The UN general assembly adopted by consensus the resolution spearheaded by Vanuatu, a tiny Pacific island nation vulnerable to extreme climate effects, and youth activists to secure a legal opinion from the international court of justice (ICJ) to clarify states’ obligations to tackle the climate crisis — and specify any consequences countries should face for inaction.”

More than 60 years ago, when West Papua was kicked around like a football by the imperial West and East, Indonesia, the Netherlands, the United Nations and the illegal UN-sponsored sham referendum of 1969, no one on this planet dared to stand up for West Papua.

West Papua was abandoned by the world.

The Dutch attempted to safeguard that “sacred trust” by enlisting West Papua into the UN Decolonisation list under article 73 of the UN charter. The Dutch did the right thing.

The sacred trust, however, was betrayed when West Papua was transferred to the United Temporary Executive (UNTEA) following the infamous New York Agreement on 15 August 1962.

This sacred trust was to be protected by the UNTEA but it was betrayed when it was handed over to Indonesia in May 1963, resulting in Indonesia’s invasion of West Papua.

This invasion instilled fear throughout West Papua, paving the way for the 1969 referendum to be held under incredible fear and gunpoint of the already intimidated 1025 Papuan elders.

In 1969, instead of protecting the trust, the UN betrayed it by being complicit in the whole tragic events unfolding.

OPM’s answer to the illegal referendum — The Act of Free Choice
OPM’s proclamation on 1 July 1971 was the answer to the (rejection of that illegal and fraudulent) referendum, known as the Penentuan Pendapat Rakyat-Pepera in 1969.

In protest, out of fear, and in resistance to one of the most tragic betrayals and tragedies in human history, an overwhelming number of Papuans left West Papua during this period. Several countries opened their arms to West Papua, including Vanuatu.

Several African countries recognised OPM’s declaration and Ben Tanggahma was the first official OPM diplomat sent to Senegal, Sponsored and funded by the Senegalese government officially.

A major split occurred in OPM camps due to internal conflict and disagreement between the two key founding members. The legacy of this tragedy has been disastrous for future Papuan resistance fighters.

Papuans are partly responsible for betraying that sacred trust as well. This realisation is critical for Papuan-self redemption. That is the secret, redemption, and genuine reconciliation.

Every time a high-profile figure from Vanuatu or any Melanesian country engages internationally, Papuans feel extremely anxious. Amid the historical betrayals, Papuans wonder, “Will they betray us or rescue us?”

This tiny doubt eats at the soul of humankind. It is always toxic, a seed that contaminates and derails human trust.

In such difficult times, it is crucial for Papuans to reflect sincerely and ask, “where are we?” Are we doing, okay? What’s going on? Are we making the right decisions, are our collective defence systems secure?

Vanuatu’s historic visit to Jakarta
Jotham Napat, the Foreign Minister of Vanuatu, visited Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi on 16 June 2023. The main topic of discussion was bilateral relations between the two countries.

It is the first visit by a Vanuatu foreign minister to Indonesia in more than a decade. This marks an important milestone.

According to Retno, “I am delighted to hear about Vanuatu’s plan to open an embassy in Indonesia, and I welcome the idea of holding annual consultations between the two countries,” in her statement.

At Monday’s meeting, Napat expressed urgency to build a sound partnership between Vanuatu and Indonesia and expressed his eagerness to recover trust. The minister also expressed his country’s eagerness to create a technical cooperation agreement between the two countries and to establish sister city and sister province partnerships, which he said could begin with Papua.

Welcoming DPM/FM Jotham Napat of Vanuatu on his 1st official visit to Indonesia – the 1st visit of FM in more than a decade

An important milestone in our bilateral relations, based on respect to sovereignty, territorial integrity & principles of mutual interests & benefits pic.twitter.com/Y8GkpwxvQC

— Menteri Luar Negeri Republik Indonesia (@Menlu_RI) June 16, 2023

During a joint press conference with Indonesian Vice-President Ma’ruf Amin, Napat expressed his commitment to the “Melanesian way”.

Vanuatu’s Napat meets Indonesian Vice-President
In response to Minister Napat’s visit to West Papua, Benny Wenda of the United Liberation Movement of West Papua (ULMWP) said he welcomed the minister’s remarks on the “Melanesian Way”. Though it isn’t really clear what the Melanesian way is all about?

“Melanesian Way” is a complicated term. Although intuitively, everyone in the Melanesian context assumes to know it. Bernard Narakobi, the person who coined the term refused to define it. It has been described by Narakobi as being comparable to Moses asking God to explain who God was to him.

“God did not reveal himself by a definition, but by a statement that I am who I am,” wrote Narakobi.

Because God is the archetypical ultimate, infallible, eternal, omnipresent, alpha and omega. Narakobi’s statement about the God and Moses analogy is true that God cannot be defined by any point of reference; God is the point of reference.

For Melanesians, however, we are not God. We are mortal, unpredictable, flawed, with aspects of both malevolence and goodness. Therefore, to state that “we are who we are” could mean anything.

We (especially those in decision-making power) need a deeper understand of not just who but what we are and what we are becoming — either a force of evil or good. Be the witness of Truth or Falsehood. This is where the real war is.

Continuing his search for a path for Melanesia, Narakobi wrote:

“Melanesian voice is meant to be a force for truth. It is meant to give witness to the truth. Whereas the final or the ultimate truth is the divine source, the syllogistically or the logical truth is dependent on the basic premises one adopts. The Melanesian voice is meant to be a forum of Melanesian wisdom and values, based on Melanesian experience.”

It seems that these truths and virtues as outlined by this great Melanesian philosopher do not have a common shared value system that binds the states of the MSG together.

‘Bought for 30 pieces of silver’
Following the rejection of ULMWP’s membership bid in Honiara in 2016, Vanuatu’s then Deputy Prime Minister, Joe Natuman, stated,

“Our Prime Minister was the only one talking in support of full membership for West Papua in the MSG, the Solomon Islands Prime Minister couldn’t say very much because he is the chairman.

“Prime Minister Charlot Salwai was the only one defending Melanesians and the history of Melanesian people in the recent MSG meeting in Honiara.

“The MSG, I must repeat, the MSG, which I was a pioneer in setting up, was established for the protection of the identity of the Melanesian people, the promotion of their culture and defending their rights. Right to self-determination, right to land and right to their resources.

“Now it appears other people are trying to use the MSG to drive their own agendas and I am sorry, but I will insist that MSG is being bought by others.

“It is just like Jesus Christ who was bought for 30 pieces of silver. This is what is happening in the MSG. I am very upset about this, and we need to correct this issue.

“Because if our friends in Fiji and Papua New Guinea have a different agenda, we need to sit down and talk very seriously about what is happening within the organisation.”

Principles or a facade?
Whatever agenda Minister Napat had in mind when he travelled to Jakarta on June 16 — in a capital of rulers whose policies have resulted in fatalistic and genocidal outcomes for West Papuans for 60 years — these wisdoms from Melanesian elders will either be his guiding principle, or he will use the term “Melanesian Way” as a facade to conceal different intents not in agreement with these Melanesian values.

These are the types of questions that are at stake for West Papua, Vanuatu, and Melanesians, particularly in a world which is rapidly changing, including ourselves and our values.

In an interview with Island Business published on 3 February 2023, Minister Napat stated his priority for the 100-day work plan.

“Vanuatu has, like other Pacific countries, too often in the past been seen in the international limelight as a subservient associate to others’ interests and agendas, this must change if Vanuatu is to take its rightful place as an equal partner in the international arena.

“The creation and implementation of a new National Foreign Policy must take into account current global geopolitical trends”.

Minister Napat continued:

“The global geopolitical environment has and will continue to change. Our government must implement foreign policy directions which will have as its first priority, the best interests of the nation and people of Vanuatu.

“Since the original foreign policy directions after independence, Vanuatu’s foreign policy approaches in the last 30 years have been at times unclear, ad hoc, and reactive to circumstances and influences. It is time we set our own course and become proactive at all times”.

Vanuatu only support
The minister did not rule out West Papua as one of the countries that influences Vanuatu’s engagement with the world. As anyone familiar with West Papua’s plight knows, Vanuatu is the only sovereign UN member country that has publicly supported West Papua.

There is no indication as to whether those “other interests” and “agendas” pertain to West Papua, Indonesia, MSG, the USA, China, or Australia.

If the minister’s trip to Jakarta was demonstrative of his pragmatic words and West Papua is one of the external interferences the Minister has implied, then Papuans can only hope for the best, that new developing relationships between Jakarta and Port Vila will not be another major betrayal for Papuans.

Minister Napa’s pragmatic approach to adapting to an unpredictable changing world is crucial for the country. Especially since Oceania is becoming increasingly similar to the New Middle East as China and the United States continue to compete, contest, revive or renew their engagement with island nations.

There is also another major player in the region, Indonesia, which has its own interests.

The government and the people of Vanuatu have a duty and responsibility to ensure they must be ready to face these vulgar threats, they pose as stated by the Minister. For persecuted Papuans, their only wish is: Please don’t betray us — the Sacred Trust.

West Papua will always remain a lingering issue — a unresolved murder mystery that has been swept under the rug. For a long time, the Vanuatu government and its people have decided to resolve this issue.

Vanuatu’s Wantok Blong Yumi Bill – Sacred Trust
On 19 June 2010, this sacred trust was protected when the notion regarding West Papua was passed by Vanuatu’s Parliament. The purpose of the “Wantok blong yumi” Bill was to allow the government of Vanuatu to develop specific policies regarding the support of West Papua’s independence struggle.

Then, both the government under the late Prime Minister Edward Natape and his opposition leader, Maxime Carlot Korman, united and sponsored the motion to be drafted by one of the young proponents of West Papua’s cause, Ralph Regevanu, on behalf of the people of Vanuatu and West Papua.

In fact, this was a historic and extraordinary event. It was called a “Parliament extraordinary session” — a sacred session. This Act is an analogy to the declaration of war by tiny young ancient Jews against the giant Goliath and his fearsome army. With a slingshot, David defeated Goliath, not with a giant weapon, bomb, or money, but with courage, bravery and faith.

The Wantok Bill was Vanuatu’s slingshot to fight against and defeat the might of pandemonium warlords and Goliath armies that tortured Papuans everyday while scavenging the richness of this paradise land that has been continuously betrayed.

After the success of the motion, the prime minister promised to sponsor the issue of West Papua at the MSG and PIF meetings.

This promise was partially fulfilled when West Papua was granted observer status in the MSG in 2015. Tragically, this courageous figure passed away on 28 July 2015 (aged 61) just a few days after West Papua was granted observer status by the MSG on June 26.

Furthermore, West Papua has seen some positive developments at an international level. In September 2016, seven Pacific Island countries raised the plight and struggle of the West Papuan people at the UN General Assembly.

A resolution was passed by the PIF in 2019 regarding West Papua.

During the ninth ACP summit of heads of state and government, Ralph Regevanu and Benny Wenda succeeded in convincing the group to pass a resolution calling for urgent attention to be paid to the rights situation in Indonesia-ruled Papua.

Vanuatu also made it possible for Pacific leaders to request that the UN Human Rights Commissioner visit West Papua in 2019. Ralph Regevanu, then Vanuatu’s Foreign Minister, drafted the wording of the PIF’s Communique.

Edward Natape also said his government would apply to the UN Decolonisation Committee for West Papua to be relisted so the territory could undergo the due process of decolonisation.

West Papuans still wait for the UN’s promised decolonisation
A long time OPM representative from West Papua, Dr John Otto Ondawame, and Andy Ayamiseba, were among those who witnessed and assisted in this victory. Sadly, both of them have since died.

Dr Ondawame died in 2014 and Andy Ayamiseba in 2020.

Both of these figures, as well as others, were long-time residents of Vanuatu since the 1980s. With their Vanuatu, Melanesia, and Oceania Wantoks, they had tirelessly fought for the rights of West Papua.

The people of West Papua continue to look towards Vanuatu and Melanesia and pray, just as the exiled diaspora of persecuted Jews looked towards Jerusalem and prayed. Vanuatu remains a beacon of hope for West Papua

Papuans’ greatest task, challenge and responsibility is to determine where to go from here.

This spirit of revolution was ignited by the OPM elders, and many brave young men, women, and elderly are fighting for it in West Papua today.

There are also many brave men and women spreading the words of West Papua’s genocide at national, regional, and international levels. The Papuan freedom fighters, irrespective of their faction, don’t have much room for mistake. A mistake made by Papuans will lead to enemies turning us into pieces without mercy.

Mistakes, whether reckless decisions, slander, internal disputes, or hatred; poor individual decisions directly impact on our lives and the existence of West Papua’s independence struggle.

On 30 June 2023, the MSG Foreign Ministers Meeting (FMM) concluded successfully with members approving the outcomes of the MSG senior officials meeting (SOM) at the MSG secretariat in Port Vila, Vanuatu. A traditional welcome ceremony was conducted for the delegates.

A progress report by the MSG Director-General was presented to the SOM, along with the secretariat’s annual reports for 2020 and 2021, a calendar of events for 2023, a proposal to establish MSG supporting offices in member countries and a draft of the MSG secretariat’s work programme and budget for 2023.

The same people who were seen in Jakarta dancing, singing and propagated imageries of gestures, symbols, images, and rhetoric are the ones driving this MSG meeting. Indonesia’s delegation with the red and white flag is also seen sitting inside the MSG’s headquarters — the sacred place, sacred building, of the Melanesian people.

The test for Vanuatu is so high at the moment — reaching a climactic decision for West Papua. Hundreds of Free West Papua social media campaigns groups are inundated with so much optimistic images, symbols, cartoon drawing, words, prayers.

Giving this connection and high emancipation with the upcoming MSG summit, Minister Jotham Napat’s visit to Jakarta was indeed a huge shock for Papuans.

For Papuans, this is a stressful time for such a visit. Pressures, anticipation, prayers, and anxiety for MSG is too high.

Adding to this, this year the Chairmanship and Leaders’ Summit of the MSG are being entrusted to Vanuatu and Vanuatu is also the home base of MSG.

One of the moments West Papua have been waiting for

In the upcoming MSG games, Vanuatu had all the best cards at her disposal to achieve something big for Papuans. Vanuatu was one of key founding fathers of MSG, the MSG embeds Vanuatu’s spirit and values.

There is much more at stake in this war, this fight, and this choice than a membership issue, it is a choice between right and wrong. Ultimately, the issue is about defending the sacred MSG — the home of Melanesian people, culture, and language as well as thousands of rich and diverse islands and spices.

It would be “THE” long-awaited moment for Papuans to enter into MSG as Papuans have been insisting that their Melanesian family has been left out for decades.

Social media images and small videos of Vanuatu’s delegation, MSG’s leader and Papuans who support the Indonesian occupation of West Papua dancing and singing during the visit was indeed disheartening for Papuans.

The imagery and propaganda of the visit spread through the media. They intended to dim Vanuatu’s dawn Morning Star. A sacred beacon of light where tortured West Papuans look to, every morning, and pray for deliverance.

Vanuatu’s “Messianic hope” for West Papua in a world where almost no nations, empires, kingdoms, and institutions such as the UN offer refuge, to listen to and seeing such propaganda imageries spread through social media is dispiriting.

Whatever the reason for this visit might be, Papuans who simply just want their freedom from Indonesia, seeing such a visit and display of their trusted friend at the headquarters of their tormentors prompts immediate questions: What happened and why?

‘Liklil Hope Tasol’ (Little Hope At All)
Dan McGarry, former media director of the Vanuatu Daily Post, writes:

“One of the more popular songs Ayamiseba wrote for the Black Brothers is ‘Liklik Hope Tasol’, a ballad written in Tok Pisin whose title translates as ‘Little Hope At All’. Its narrator lies awake in the early morning hours, the victim of despair.

The vision of the Morning Star and a songbird breaking the pre-dawn hush provide the impetus to survive another day. The song, with its clear political imagery and simplistic evocation of strength in adversity, is clearly autobiographical. It is, arguably, the anthem which animated Ayamiseba’s lifelong pursuit of freedom.”

Such an extravagant display of rhetoric and imagery in the capital of the Pandemonium army that has mercilessly been hunting down “Papuans” on “their ancient timeless land”, New Guinea, as PNG philosopher Narakobi described it, or “little heaven” as Papuans referred to it, can only mean two things: either destroy that “little hope” or “rescue it”.

Only God knows the answer to this question as well of the real intent of the visit and what outcome will emerge from it — will it bring disappearance or hope for Papuans.

The late Pastor Allen Nafuki, a key figure in Vanuatu responsible for bringing warring factions of Papuan resistance groups together in Port Vila in 2014, which helped precipitate much of the ULMWP’s international success, left his last message on West Papua before he died: “God will never sleep for West Papua.”

Papuans appreciated and were encouraged by the pastor’s message. What is at stake is to make sure we don’t fall asleep in this fight.

Vanuatu is a sovereign independent country and as a sovereign nation, Vanuatu has every right to choose to whom she wants to be friends with, visit and sign any treaties and agreements with.

However, when the sacred trust of hope for the betrayed, rejected, persecuted nation like West Papuans is entrusted to them either by choice, force, or compassion, then the choice is clear: You either betray that trust, compromise it, or protect it.

The seed of the sacred bond planted by legendary OPM freedom fighters when the nation of Vanuatu was founded, before MSG was founded, will be either dimmed, betrayed, or resurrected.

The 2010 “Wantok Blong Yumi” Bill should be resurrected and protection given for the “Sacred Trust” (The Sovereignty of West Papua) that has been betrayed for more than 60 years.

The United Nations was the place that the Sacred Trust was betrayed and Vanuatu as a new Guardian of this Trust should restore that trust in the same institution. The statement by the former UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki Moon, during the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) Summit in Auckland stated: “West Papua is an issue; the right place for it to be discussed, is the Decolonisation Committee of UNGA”.

Yamin Kogoya is a West Papuan academic who has a Master of Applied Anthropology and Participatory Development from the Australian National University and who contributes to Asia Pacific Report. From the Lani tribe in the Papuan Highlands, he is currently living in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.

• Other Yamin Kogoya articles

France’s grip on its overseas territories in the Pacific may be waning, with pro-independence delegates now claiming to have the support of the majority of their indigenous people in their territories.

The delegates from New Caledonia and French Polynesia spoke during talks at the UN’s Special Committee on Decolonisation this week.

The sensitive issues of indigenous rights were part of the speeches delivered by the delegates from Kanaky New Caledonia and French Polynesia — French “overseas territories and collectivities” — at the UN.

• READ MORE: Protesters call for West Papua to be included on UN ‘decolonisation’ list
• Other UN decolonisation reports

Kanaky — an ‘illegitimate referendum’
Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) delegate Magalie Tingal-Lémé repudiated a controversial 2021 referendum that had rejected independence from France, which had been boycotted by pro-independence groups in the wake of the covid pandemic.

“We believe that through this illegitimate referendum, the French state has robbed us of our independence,” said Tingal-Lémé.

“We will never accept this outcome and so, unable to contest the results under French internal law, we are turning to the international community for an impartial institution to indicate how to resume a process that complies with international rules on decolonisation.”

Tingal-Lémé told the committee that the indigenous Kanaks of New Caledonia were unhappy with the status quo, accusing France of breaking the UN’s principles of freedom and equality.

“Every time we speak before your institution, we carry the voice of the colonised people,” said Tingal-Lémé.

“When we speak of colonisation, we are necessarily speaking of the people who have suffered the damage, the stigma and the consequences.”

French Polynesia — government supports decolonisation
Pro-independence Tahitian politician Vannina Crolas also advocated for the independence of a collective of islands in eastern Polynesian known as “French” Polynesia.

Like New Caledonia, the island group has been a part of France since the 19th century, but opinions of independence are more divided among the native French Polynesians who have experienced a more positive historical relationship with Paris than their Kanak neighbours.

Earlier this year, the pro-independence party Tāvini Huiraʻatira Party — led by Moetai Brotherson — won the Territorial Assembly’s 2023 presidential election by 38 votes to 19 over the ruling anti-independence Tapura Huira’atira Party.

Delegate Crolas told the committee that Brotherson had recently met President Emmanuel Macron and that the French government had so far respected the democratic processes in French Polynesia, which at the moment appears to be moving towards independence.

“France values democracy as much as our government does, and if I stand here in front of you today it’s because of democracy,” said Crolas.

“I’m here to represent the government that our people elected democratically to confirm to your committee and the world, that the government of French Polynesia fully supports the proper decolonisation and self-determination process under the scrutiny of the United Nations.”

Tokelau — committed to self-determination
Tokelau head of government Kerisiano Kalolo told the Special Committee on Decolonisation that he was committed to self-determination.

A referendum held in Tokelau in 2007 showed that more than 64 percent of Tokelauans supported removing the current political status of the islands, although the results were not enough to bring about change.

Kalolo said there was renewed interest and that he was pushing for independence.

He stressed he would maintain strong economic ties with New Zealand.

“The General Fono agreed to revive the conversation on self-determination and the future political status of Tokelau, and we plan to initiate that in the second half of the year,” said Kalolo.

“Madam chair, the relationship between Tokelau and the government of New Zealand is significant and we will continue to look towards New Zealand and development partners for support.”

The UN Special Committee on Decolonisation meeting concludes this week.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Caledonia’s Kanak national liberation movement has told the UN Decolonisation Committee that France has “robbed” the indigenous people of their independence and has appealed for help.

Magalie Tingal-Lémé, the permanent representative of the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) at the UN, told a session of the Committee of 24 (C24) — as the special decolonisation body is known — that the French authorities had failed to honour the 1998 Noumea Accord self-determination aspirations, especially by pressing ahead with the third independence referendum in December 2021 in defiance of Kanak opposition.

More than half the eligible voting population boycotted the third ballot after the previous two referendums in 2018 and 2020 recorded narrowing defeats for independence.

• READ MORE: Politician tells UN New Caledonia is not a colony
• Unfinished business over New Caledonian decolonisation – new challenges after ‘stolen’ referendum
• Independence for Kanaky: A media and political stalemate or a ‘three strikes’ Frexit challenge?
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

The pro-independence Kanak groups wanted the referendum delayed due to the devastating impact that the covid-19 pandemic had had on the indigenous population.

Tingal-Lémé told the UN session that speaking as an indigenous Kanak woman, she represented the FLNKS and “every time we speak before your institution, we carry the voice of the colonised people”.

“When we speak of colonisation, we are necessarily speaking of the people who have suffered the damage, the stigma and the consequences,” she said in her passionate speech.

“On September 24, my country will have been under colonial rule for 170 years.”

Accords brought peace
Tingal-Lémé said two political accords with France had brought peace to New Caledonia after the turbulent 1980s, “the second of which — the Nouméa Accord — [was taking] the country on the way for full emancipation”.

“And it is in a spirit of dialogue and consensus that the indépendentistes have kept their word, despite, and in the name, of spilled blood.”

In 2018, the first of three scheduled votes on sovereignty, 56.4 percent rejected independence with an 81 percent turnout of the 174,995 voters eligible to vote.

Two years later, independence was again rejected, but this time with an increased support to almost 47 percent. Turnout also slightly grew to 85.69 percent.

However, in December 2021 the turnout dropped by about half with most Kanaks boycotting the referendum due to the pandemic. Unsurprisingly, this time the “yes” vote dropped to a mere 3.5 percent.

“Since December 12, 2021, when France maintained the third and final referendum — even though we had requested its postponement due to the human trauma of covid-19 — we have never ceased to contest its holding and its results,” Tingal-Lémé said.

Nearly 57 percent of voters had not turned out on the day due to the covid boycott.

‘We’ll never accept this outcome’
“We believe that through this illegitimate referendum, the French state has robbed us of our independence. We will never accept this outcome!

“And so, unable to contest the results under French internal law, we are turning to the international community for an impartial institution to indicate how to resume a process that complies with international rules on decolonisation.

“Through the Nouméa Accord, France has committed itself and the populations concerned to an original decolonisation process, which should lead to the full emancipation of Kanaky.

“Today, the FLNKS believes that the administering power has not fulfilled its obligations.”

Tingal-Lémé said the “latest evidence” of this failure was a New Caledonian decolonisation audit, whose report had just been made public.

She said this audit report had been requested by the FLNKS for the past five years so that it would be available — along with the assessment of the Nouméa Accord — before the three referendums to “enlighten voters”.

“The pro-independence movement found itself alone in raising public awareness of the positive stakes of self-determination, and had to campaign against a state that sided with the anti-independence groups.”

Magalie Tingal-Lémé’s speech to the UN Decolonisation Committee. Video: MTL

Entrusted to a ‘market’ firm
Also, the French government had “entrusted” this work to a firm specialising in market analysis strategies, she said.

“This shows how much consideration the administering power has given to this exercise and to its international obligations regarding the decolonisation.

“Frankly, who can believe in the objectivity of an audit commissioned by a government to which the leader of New Caledonia’s non-independence movement belongs?” Tingal-Lémé asked.

“It is already clear that, once again, France does not wish to achieve a decolonisation in the Pacific.

“This is why the FLNKS is petitioning the C24 to support our initiative to the United Nations, with the aim of getting an advisory opinion to the International Court of Justice.

“The objectives of this initiative is to request the ICJ to rule on our [indigenous] rights, those of the colonised people of New Caledonia, which we believe were violated on December 12, 2021.”

Advisory opinion
The FLNKS wanted the ICJ to make an advisory opinion on the way France “has conducted the decolonisation process, in particular by holding a referendum without the participation of the Kanak people.”

Tingal-Lémé pleaded: “We sincerely hope that you will heed our call.”

According to New Caledonia’s 2019 census, the indigenous Kanaks comprise a 41 percent share of the 271,000 multiethnic population. Europeans make up 24 percent, Wallisians and Futunans 8 percent, and a mix of Indonesians, ni-Vanuatu, Tahitians and Vietnamese are among the rest.

Earlier today, RNZ Pacific reported that a New Caledonian politician had claimed at the UN that the territory was “no longer a colony” and should be withdrawn from the UN decolonisation list.

The anti-independence member of the Territorial Congress and Vice-President of the Southern Province, Gil Brial, said he was a descendant of French people deported to New Caledonia 160 years ago, who had been “blended with others, including the indigenous Kanaks”.

He said the only colonisation left today was the “colonisation of the minds of young people by a few separatist leaders who mixed racism, hatred and threats”, reports RNZ Pacific.

Dr David Robie is editor of Asia Pacific Report.

New Caledonia’s pro-independence FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front)  says the advice of the International Court of Justice is being sought over the contested 2021 referendum on independence from France.

The movement — represented by Roch Wamytan, who is President of New Caledonia’s Congress — told a UN Decolonisation Committee meeting in Bali, Indonesia, that it considered holding the vote violated the Kanaks’ right in their quest for self-determination.

New Caledonia has been on the UN decolonisation list since 1986, and under the terms of the Noumea Accord three referendums on restoring New Caledonia’s full sovereignty were held between 2018 and 2021.

• READ MORE: Other New Caledonia decolonisation reports

The date for the last one was set by Paris but because of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the Kanak population, the pro-independence parties asked for the vote to be postponed.

The French government refused to agree to the plea and as a consequence, the pro-independence parties boycotted the poll in protest.

The FLNKS told the Bali meeting that the final referendum went ahead “under pressure from the French state with more than 2000 soldiers deployed and under a hateful and degrading campaign against the Kanaks”.

A total of 57 percent of registered voters stayed away, almost halving the turnout over the preceding referendum in 2020.

Among those who voted, more than 96 percent rejected independence, up from 56 percent the year before.

In view of the low turnout, the FLNKS stated “it is inconceivable that one can consider that a minority determines the future of New Caledonia”.

‘Legal and binding’, says France
However, the French government insists that the vote was legal and binding, being backed by a French court decision which last year threw out a complaint by the customary Kanak Senate, calling for the result to be annulled.

The court found that neither constitutional provisions nor the organic law made the validity of the vote conditional on a minimum turnout.

It added that the year-long mourning declared by the Kanak customary Senate in September 2021 was not such as to affect the sincerity of the vote.

The court also noted that by the time of the referendum on December 12, more than 77 percent of the population was vaccinated.

The anti-independence parties in New Caledonia also consider the referendum outcome as the legitimate outcome despite only a tiny minority of the indigenous Kanak population having voted.

The FLNKS has been pleading for international support to uphold the rights of the indigenous people and in its campaign to have the last referendum annulled.

The Melanesian Spearhead Group said in 2021 that the referendum should not be recognised but the chair of the Pacific Islands Forum Mark Brown, of Cook Islands, did not back the move when asked about it this month, saying the Forum would not “intrude into the domestic matters of countries”.

‘French law has failed the Kanaks’
The statement by the FLNKS to the Bali meeting said that “international bodies are our last resort to safeguard our rights as a colonised people”, adding that French domestic law has failed to give the Kanaks such protection.

It pleaded for the UN Decolonisation Committee to support the FLNKS in its case at the International Court of Justice.

The FLNKS said the ICJ was established with one of the principal purposes of the United Nations, which is to maintain, by peaceful means and in accordance with international law, peace and security.

It also said he would like to get support for an official request so that the FLNKS can get observer status at the United Nations.

A Kanak leader, Julien Boanemoi, told the gathering the decolonisation process in New Caledonia was at risk of “backtracking”, alleging that France was engaged in a modern version of colonisation.

He said with the French proclamation of the “Indo-Pacific axis”, the Kanak people felt a repeat of the French behaviour of 1946 and 1963 when Paris withdrew the territory from the decolonisation list and stifled the pro-independence Caledonian Union.

Boanemoi said with the lack of neutrality of the administering power France, he wanted to warn the Decolonisation Committee of “the risks of jeopardising stability and peace in New Caledonia”.

Darmanin back in Noumea
On Wednesday, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin is due in New Caledonia for talks on a new statute for the territory.

Central to his talks with the FLNKS on Friday will be discussions about the roll used for provincial elections.

Darmanin signalled in March that the restricted roll would be opened to more voters, which the FLNKS regards as unacceptable.

Last month, the president of the Caledonian Union, which is the main party within the FLNKS, said there was a risk of there being no more provincial elections if the rolls changed.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Caledonia’s largest pro-independence party says the latest French pronouncement on self-determination is an insult to the decolonisation process.

Amid a dispute over the validity of the referendum process under the Noumea Accord, French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin told the United Nations last week that self-determination might take “one or two generations”.

The Caledonian Union said the statement contradicted the 1998 Noumea Accord which was to conclude after 20 years with New Caledonia’s full emancipation.

• READ MORE: France briefs UN on New Caledonia decolonisation impasse
• Other French Pacific decolonisation reports

However, three referendums on independence from France between 2018 and 2021 to complete the Accord resulted in the rejection of full sovereignty.

But the Caledonian Union says the trajectory set out in the Noumea Accord has not changed and the process must conclude with New Caledonia attaining full sovereignty.

In a statement, the party has accused France of being contradictory by defending peoples’ right to self-determination at the UN while not respecting the colonised Kanak people’s request and imposing the 2021 referendum.

The date was set by Paris but because of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the indigenous Kanak population, the pro-independence parties asked for the vote to be postponed.

The French government refused to accede to the plea and as a consequence the pro-independence parties stayed away from the poll in protest.

Although more than 96 percent voted against full sovereignty, the turnout was 43 percent, with record abstention among Kanaks at the centre of the decolonisation issue.

Pro-independence parties therefore refuse to recognise the result as a legitimate outcome of the decolonisation process.

They insist that the vote is not valid despite France’s highest administrative court finding the referendum was legal and binding.

Darmanin due back in Noumea
The latest meeting of the Caledonian Union’s leadership this week was to prepare for next week’s talks with Darmanin, who is due in Noumea for a second time in three months.

Paris wants to advance discussions on a new statute after the referendums.

In its statement, the Caledonian Union said it wanted France to specify what its policies for New Caledonia would be, adding that for the party, they had to be in line with the provisions of the Noumea Accord.

The party said fresh talk of self-determination should not be a pretext of France to divert from the commitments in the Accord.

It also said it would not yet enter into formal discussions with the anti-independence parties about the way forward although they also were Noumea Accord signatories.

The party also said it would not discuss the make-up of New Caledonia’s electoral rolls until after a path to full sovereignty had been drawn up in bilateral talks with the French government.

On La Premiere television on Sunday night, Congress President Roch Wamytan, who is a Noumea Accord signatory and a Caledonian Union member, said his side had a different timetable than Paris.

While the French government was focused on next year’s provincial elections, Wamytan said it was not possible to discuss in the space of a month or two the future of a country or of a people that had been colonised.

He also wondered if Darmanin was serious when he said it could take two generations, or 50 years, for self-determination.

Wamytan said after the failed 2021 referendum, the two sides had diametrically opposed positions.

However, he hoped at some point a common platform could be found so that in the coming months a way would be found as a “win-win for New Caledonia”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

An Australian advocacy group has called for West Papua to be reinscribed on the United Nations list of “non self-governing territories”, citing the “sham” vote in 1969 and the worsening human rights violations in the Indonesian-ruled Melanesian region.

The UN Special Committee on Decolonisation began its 2023 Pacific Regional Seminar in Bali, Indonesia, today and will continue until May 26.

Tomorrow the annual International Week of Solidarity with the Peoples of Non-Self-Governing Territories is due to begin tomorrow and will end on May 31.

• READ MORE: The UN Decolonisation Committee on Kanaky New Caledonia
• The UN committee on Tahiti
• Other West Papua reports

“Although West Papua is not on the list  of  Non-Self-Governing Territories, it should be,” said Joe Collins of the Australia West Papua Association (AWPA).

“It’s 60 years since UNTEA transferred West Papua to Indonesian administration, which then unceremoniously removed it from the list.

“As for the so-called Act of Free Choice held in 1969, it was a sham and is referred to by West Papuans as the ‘act of no choice’.”

‘Seriously deteriorating’
Collins said in a statement today that the situation in West Papua was “seriously deteriorating” with ongoing human rights abuses in the territory.

“There are regular armed clashes between the Free Papua Movement [OPM] and the Indonesian security forces,” he said.

“West Papuans continue to be arrested at peaceful demonstrations and Papuans risk being charged with treason for taking part in the rallies.

“The military operations in the highlands have created up to 60,000 internally displaced people (IDPs), many facing starvation because they fear returning to their food gardens because of the Indonesian security forces.

“Recent armed clashes have also created new IDPs.

Collins cited New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens, who has been held hostage by the West Papuan National Liberation Army (TPNPB) for more than three months.

According to Mehrtens as quoted by ABC News on April 26, the Indonesian military had been “dropping bombs” in the area where he was being held, making it “dangerous for me and everybody here”.

‘French’ Polynesia an example
“We cannot expect the [UN Decolonisation Committee] to review the situation of West Papua at this stage as it would only bring to attention the complete failure by the UN to protect the people of West Papua.

However, territories had been reinscribed in the past as in the case of “French” Polynesia in 2013, Collins said.

But Collins said it was hoped that the UN committee could take some action.

“As they meet in Bali, it is hoped that the C24 members — who would be well aware of the ongoing human rights abuses in West Papua committed by the Indonesian security forces — will urge Jakarta to allow the High Commissioner for Human Rights to visit West Papua on a fact-finding mission to report on the deteriorating human rights situation in the territory.”

“It’s the least they could do.”

French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has invited the United Nations Decolonisation Committee members to visit New Caledonia.

Controlled by France since 1853, New Caledonia was returned to the UN decolonisation list as prolonged political violence threatened in 1986 — 39 years after France had withdrawn it and its other major Pacific colony from the 19th century, French Polynesia, from the list.

France says it has complied with the UN decolonisation process and regularly exchanged with the UN about New Caledonia.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Walter Zweifel talks about Tahiti’s recent election

During a visit to the United States last week, Darmanin stopped at the UN in New York to discuss the aftermath of the three referendums on independence which France organised in New Caledonia between 2018 and 2021.

Darmanin, who as Interior Minister is also responsible for France’s overseas possessions, said he had a constructive exchange, without elaborating.

He said, however, he wondered how “to trigger this right to self-determination on the scale of one or two generations”.

Darmanin also told the committee that after the referendums, France was trying to negotiate with both the pro- and anti-independence camps to formulate a future status for New Caledonia.

What next for New Caledonia?
The outcome of the referendum process as outlined in the 1998 Noumea Accord is in dispute, with the pro-independence parties claiming the rejection of independence is illegitimate because of the low turn-out of the colonised Kanak people in the last vote.

France had gone ahead with the third referendum despite a plea by pro-independence parties to postpone it because of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the Kanak population.

The pro-independence side refuses to recognise the result, saying that the referendum was not in the spirit of the 1998 Noumea Accord and the UN resolutions on the territory’s decolonisation.

It said the path of dialogue had been broken by the stubbornness of the French government, which was unable to reconcile its geostrategic interests in the Pacific with its obligation to decolonise New Caledonia.

The pro-independence camp has been lobbying for support to get the referendum outcome annulled.

However, a legal challenge in Paris last year by the customary Kanak Senate was unsuccessful while a further challenge of the referendum result filed with the International Court of Justice is pending.

New PIF chair taking ‘neutral’ position
This month, the Pacific Islands Forum said it would “not intrude” into New Caledonia’s affairs although a subgroup, the Melanesian Spearhead Group, had earlier backed calls for the UN to declare the result null and void.

Asked for the Forum’s view, its chair, Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown, said the “Forum respects the due process of each country”.

“It is not the Forum’s role to intrude into the domestic matters of countries as they determine their independence or their dependence on other countries,” Brown said.

The pro-independence side has refused to engage with the anti-independence side in discussions about any new statute. Instead, it has insisted on having bilateral talks with only the French government on a timetable to conclude the decolonisation process and restore New Caledonia’s sovereignty.

In March, Darmanin visited New Caledonia for talks with a cross-section of society, and last month New Caledonia’s political leaders were in Paris for more discussions.

None of these meetings have yielded a consensus on a way forward.

Audition cet après-midi à l’@ONU_fr par le C24, comité des Nations Unies en charge des sujets de décolonisation, afin de faire le point sur la Nouvelle-Calédonie.
Merci à la présidente du comité et aux pays membres pour cet échange riche et constructif. Au nom du Gouvernement,… pic.twitter.com/Ya5BY1k9Kc

— Gérald DARMANIN (@GDarmanin) May 19, 2023

Next week, Darmanin is due back in Noumea in a renewed effort to advance discussions on New Caledonia’s future status.

The anti-independence parties want Paris to honour the referendum result and move towards reintegration of New Caledonia into France by abolishing the restricted rolls created with the Noumea Accord.

The push received support last week from the deputy leader of France’s Republicans François Xavier Bellamy who visited Noumea.

He said his side would support changes to the French constitution to allow for the rolls to be opened up — a move firmly resisted by the pro-independence side.

French Polynesia marks 10th reinscription anniversary

The ruling pro-independence Tavini Huira’atira party in French Polynesia marked the 10th anniversary of the territory’s reinscription in Faa’a where the party founder and leader Oscar Temaru is mayor.

His decades-long campaign succeeded in 2013 when the UN General Assembly approved a resolution — sponsored by Solomon Islands — and re-inscribed French Polynesia on the world body’s decolonisation list.

The decision, which came in the dying days of the last government led by Temaru, was vehemently criticised by the Tahitian government, which succeeded his, as well as France, which labelled the UN decision an “interference”.

While France has refused to attend any UN discussion on French Polynesia, the pro-autonomy government of the past decade regularly sent delegates to the annual gathering in New York.

Marking the anniversary this year, Tavini’s youngest assembly member Tematai Le Gayic told Tahiti Nui TV he was disappointed that the “French state agrees to negotiate when there is bloodshed”, referring to New Caledonia’s unrest of the 1980s.

“But when it’s with respect of law and democracy, France denies the process,” he added.

The opposition Tapura’s Tepuaraurii Teriitahi said that it would be good “if France accepted once and for all, to avoid any controversy, that UN observers could come to French Polynesia”.

While viewing independence as a long-term goal, the newly elected President Moetai Brotherson has been critical of France shunning the UN process, having described it as a “bad look”.

At the event in Faa’a, Brotherson said they went to ask the UN “to give us the possibility of choice, with a neutral arbiter”.

He said it was then up to his party to awaken consciences so that an overwhelming majority would vote for independence, which he said was not an end in itself but an essential step to building a nation.

“We don’t want a 50 percent-plus-one-vote victory,” he said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Caledonia’s largest pro-independence party has been told that France is “panicking” and afraid of losing New Caledonia.

The head of the Caledonian Union Daniel Goa briefed the party in Koumac after a week of meetings of a cross-section of New Caledonian politicians with the French government in Paris earlier this month.

Goa said Paris kept reneging on earlier undertakings by pressing ahead with efforts to undo the 1998 Noumea Accord on the territory’s decolonisation in order to maintain its international influence.

• READ MORE: Unfinished business over New Caledonian decolonisation – new challenges after ‘stolen’ referendum
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

He said there was major incomprehension on part of the French government of what the bilateral talks in Paris were supposed to be about.

Goa said Paris wanted concrete decisions in circumstances favouring the French government.

However, Goa said the decolonisation process and New Caledonia’s accession to sovereignty would be discussed in New Caledonia.

He again warned France against opening up the restricted electoral roll used for provincial elections.

Bid to extend voting rights
Anti-independence parties have urged Paris to extend voting rights for the 2024 elections after the 2021 referendum saw a majority of voters reject full sovereignty.

The pro-independence side, however, largely abstained from the vote in 2021 because of the covid-19 pandemic and still refuses to recognise the result as the legitimate outcome of the decolonisation process.

Under the terms of the Noumea Accord voting in provincial elections is restricted to indigenous Kanaks and those who have been residents in the territory since 1998.

About 40,000 French citizens are excluded from provincial elections but can take part in France’s parliamentary and presidential elections.

Goa warned of what he called irreversible solutions if France imposed a change to the rolls, adding that there would be a risk of there never being any election.

He said the survival of the Kanaks hinged on this issue.

Goa said opening the roll to recent arrivals would create a new imbalance and extinguish the Kanaks’ vision of politics.

‘Colonial state’ opposed
He stressed that the Kanaks would no longer allow the colonial state to impose itself.

He said the French state was pushing the Kanaks to their last entrenchments, but they would be present in their own way to take responsibility to liberate their country.

Goa said the Kanaks’ sovereignty was no longer negotiable, adding that the land is not a land of France and will never be a land of France.

He said it was a shame to imagine the worst, but France was going against the “wind of history” as the United Nations kept calling for the eradication of colonialism.

Goa said France had to choose between moving in the direction of history or ending up in the “rubbish bin of colonial history”.

He put Paris on notice that a refusal to restore the territory’s sovereignty would drive the Kanak people to seek support elsewhere.

Goa said France did not and would not recognise the Kanaks’ rights, which would prompt the pro-independence camp to turn to new allies.

France ‘lonely in Pacific’
He said all major powers were around the Pacific rim but France, as only a small European country, was lonely in the Pacific.

Goa said the French army never defended New Caledonia when it was threatened, but only killed Kanaks, plundered their land, carried out punitive expeditions, brutally treated and displaced Kanak populations, and killed their elders.

He also castigated President Emmanuel Macron’s China policy, asking whether France could be trusted.

Goa said France still wanted to give the illusion of existing in a concert of nations but the President, out of clumsiness, had betrayed his European and American allies by pledging allegiance to China.

He said in the Pacific context, France would on one hand “sell” New Caledonia to China and on the other hand, France kept saying not to deal with China in whatever way, brandishing the “Chinese threat” as the worst thing that could happen.

Goa said with the French presidency and the country adrift, there was a risk for New Caledonia to be dragged into a void.

Backes slams Goa’s speech
Daniel Goa’s speech was criticised by a leading anti-independence politician, Sonia Backes, who regarded Goa’s comments about the electoral rolls as a call to violence.

Backes, president of the Southern Province and a junior member of the French government, told La Première television that Goa’s threats of action in case of changes to the rolls were unacceptable.

She also took issue with Goa’s warning that the Kanaks would ally themselves with other powers, should their ambition to attain independence be thwarted by France.

Backes said the anti-independence coalition had referred the speech to the public prosecutor for alleged calls for violence and sedition.

She wondered if Goa considered that those opposed to independence had no place on this world and could not be asked to discuss the future.

Backes said the other side needed to explain itself.

Institutions not functioning
She said her side had an interest in finding a consensus because New Caledonia’s institutions no longer functioned.

She added that it was no longer possible to have 45,000 people excluded from the rolls and do nothing for them while waiting for a possible consensus on how to open the rolls.

After the rejection of full sovereignty in three referendums and the expiry of the Noumea Accord, a new statute for New Caledonia has to be created.

While the pro-independence parties want Paris to give a timetable to full independence, the anti-independence parties want Paris to realign the territory with France.

After this month’s talks in Paris, discussions will be continued in Noumea in June when  French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin plans his next visit.

His ministry said in May he would go to the United Nations in New York to discuss the situation in New Caledonia.

The territory has been on the UN decolonisation list since 1986, based on the Kanak people’s internationally recognised right to self-determination.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

None of the parties making up New Caledonia’s pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) will attend this week’s talks in France about New Caledonia’s new political statute.

The previously undecided UNI faction also said it would be absent after the FLNKS had already said it would not send an official delegation to Paris.

Last December, more than 96 percent voted against full sovereignty for New Caledonia in the last of three referendums on independence from France held under the 1998 Noumea Accord.

• READ MORE: Other Kanaky New Caledonia independence reports

However, the pro-independence groups boycotted that vote after unsuccessfully seeking a postponement due to the impact that the covid-19 pandemic had had on the indigenous Kanak population.

Turnout of the eligible voters was less than 44 percent.

The Accord stipulates that in the case of three “no” votes, the political partners would meet to examine the situation – which had now arisen.

The Accord, which provided for a gradual and irreversible transfer of power from France to New Caledonia, expired amid controversy as the pro-independence side refused to recognise the vote as the legitimate outcome of the decolonisation process.

Right to self-determination
The territory has been on the UN Decolonisation list since 1986, based on the Kanak people’s internationally recognised right to self-determination.

The pro-independence parties abstained from voting after Paris refused to postpone the referendum to this year over concern triggered by the pandemic’s impact on the indigenous Kanak population.

A legal challenge in France’s highest administrative court — filed by the Kanak customary Senate — was rejected, with the court ruling in June that the impact of the pandemic was not a reason to consider the referendum invalid.

Discussions on New Caledonia’s future status were put on hold for the better part of the first half of this year because of campaigning for first the French presidential and then the parliamentary elections.

Two ministers in the new French government formed in June promised to visit New Caledonia but abandoned their plans, making last month’s arrival of the new junior Overseas Minister Jean-Francois Carenco in Noumea the first visit of a minister of the new administration.

Tasked with re-establishing dialogue among the key parties, Carenco concluded days of talks with a cross-section of leaders with an announcement that the key leaders would meet in Paris in October.

Following his trip, the plan was for both pro- and anti-independence leaders to meet the Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin for separate bilateral talks on Thursday, followed by a broader meeting on Friday, chaired by Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne.

Wider representation
The gathering under her leadership — dubbed Convention of Partners — is expected to include representatives of sectors of society outside the political leaders that made up the signatories to the Noumea Accord.

The UNI faction of the FLNKS explained its absence this week by saying it failed to get a reply from Carenco about details of the planned talks.

The anti-independence parties, however, will attend the talks, as will the ethnic Wallisian party and kingmaker in New Caledonia’s Congress, the Pacific Awakening party.

A leading anti-independence politician and president of New Caledonia’s Southern Province, Sonia Backes, said she would quit her position in the French government if it failed to open up New Caledonia’s electoral rolls.

Backes was made Secretary of Citizenship within the French Interior Ministry when Borne reshuffled her government in July.

Under the Noumea Accord, which is enshrined in the French constitution, voting rights in provincial elections are restricted to indigenous people and residents living in New Caledonia since the 1990s.

The anti-independence camp said restricted electoral rolls could no longer be justified after last December’s vote.

Threat to resign
Backes said she would resign from the Paris job if the government did not change the rolls or went against what New Caledonians had voted for — a reference to the electorate’s rejection of full sovereignty in three referendums.

Pro-independence leaders, however, insist that the rolls must not be touched, fearing a change would “bury the indigenous Kanaks as a minority”.

More than 40,000 French residents lack full voting rights in New Caledonia, being allowed to vote in French national elections only.

The anti-independence side insists the opening of the electoral roll has to be integral to a new statute for a New Caledonia within France.

Last year, Paris announced plans for a new referendum in June on a new statute, but the project was deferred in the face of the pro-independence parties’ refusal to engage in the process outlined by France.

Comprehensive talks on the referendums’ aftermath will have to wait until the pro-independence signatories to the Noumea Accord agree to negotiate.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Louis Kotra Uregei, an emblematic and radical figure in the independence struggle in New Caledonia, has died aged 71, announced the Union of Kanak and Exploited Workers (USTKE) in a statement.

Nicknamed LKU or “Loulou”, this representative of New Caledonian militancy died on Thursday night after a long illness.

Originally from the small island of Tiga, in the Loyalty archipelago, Louis Kotra Uregei founded USTKE, the very first independence union, in 1981.

• READ MORE: Nouvelle-Calédonie : Louis Kotra Uregei, fondateur de l’USTKE, est décédé
• Future of Kanaky New Caledonia
• Other reports on the Kanak independence movement

Three years later, the USTKE participated in the creation of the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS).

In 1988, the day after the hostage-taking in Ouvéa, which killed 21 people, Uregei had been part of the independence delegation sent to Paris to negotiate with the French State and signed the Matignon-Oudinot agreements.

While the USTKE became the second largest trade union force in New Caledonia, Uregei, known for his outspokenness and his radical methods, gradually moved away from the FLNKS and approached anti-globalisation circles.

‘Man of conviction’
In 2007, he founded the Labour Party, in the presence of José Bové, of which he would be the representative at the congress, from 2009 to 2019.

The independence party and member of the FLNKS Caledonian Union paid tribute on Friday to “an independentist leader, who did not mince his words . . .  and who knew how to remind today’s generation of leaders where and how it had to be fought to be heard on the national and international stage”.

The French High Commissioner in New Caledonia, Patrice Faure, hailed the memory of “a committed activist and a man of conviction”.

French Polynesia’s pro-independence Tavini Huiraatira party says France’s refusal to engage in any UN-supervised decolonisation process is becoming increasingly untenable.

In 2013, the UN General Assembly re-inscribed the French territory on its decolonisation list, but Paris has rejected the decision and keeps boycotting the annual decolonisation committee’s debate on French Polynesia.

While France cooperates with the UN on the decolonisation of New Caledonia, the French government has ignored calls by Tavini to invite the UN to assess the territory’s situation.

• READ MORE: Other reports on Tahiti’s decolonisation

On return from New York last week, the Tavini delegates said they will raise the continued French inaction in the French National Assembly’s Foreign Affairs Commission.

The territory’s Assembly members in Paris are Tavini politicians, who won all three seats in the June election.

One of them, Moetai Brotherson, said he spoke to the French ambassador outside the committee venue to tell him that France’s “empty chair policy isn’t a good look”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Delegates from French Polynesia have flown to New York for the annual meeting of the UN Decolonisation Committee.

The veteran pro-independence leader Oscar Temaru is heading his team while the French Polynesian government has sent the Equipment Minister Rene Temeharo as its spokesperson.

The territory was reinscribed on the list on non-self-governing territories in 2013, but France refuses to accept the inscription and engage in any UN-supervised process.

He said French Polynesia was not a colony as it had a democratically elected territorial government.

France has not responded to calls to hold a referendum on independence.

The other main French territory in the Pacific, Kanaky New Caledonia, has been on the UN Decolonisation List since 1986, which France has recognised.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

New Caledonia’s pro-independence Palika party has joined the Caledonian Union in rejecting talks in Paris announced by the French Interior Ministry.

The ministry called a meeting of the signatories to the 1998 Noumea Accord for September as France plans to draw up a new statute for New Caledonia after last December’s boycotted referendum saw a majority of voters opt to remain French.

Palika spokesperson Charles Washetine said the French state had abandoned any notion of “impartiality” and wants to impose such talks amid pressure from the political right.

• READ MORE: Other Kanak independence reports

The head of the Caledonian Union, Daniel Goa, said his side would not go to Paris, describing the proposed talks as a sham and adding that if any talks were to go ahead, they would have to be held in New Caledonia and about ways to give the territory its sovereignty.

He also said any talks would be bilateral ones between his side and Paris, meaning that they would not involve New Caledonia’s anti-independence parties.

Noumea trip cancelled
The Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin had earlier announced a visit to Noumea before the end of next week, but the trip has reportedly been cancelled.

His ministry said he would visit New Caledonia after the Paris talks planned for September.

The anti-independence camp welcomed Darmanin’s proposed talks to conclude the process set out in the Noumea Accord.

New Caledonia has been on the UN Decolonisation List since 1986 and despite the referendum outcome, the Kanaks’ right to self-determination remains an inalienable international right.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

An indigenous legal challenge in a bid to annul the result of last December’s referendum on New Caledonia’s independence from France has failed.

The highest administrative court in Paris has rejected a claim by the Kanak customary Senate that the impact of the covid-19 pandemic was such that the referendum outcome was illegitimate.

More than 96 percent voted against independence in the third and last referendum under the Noumea Accord, but more than 56 percent of voters abstained.

• READ MORE: Other reports on the New Caledonian referendums

The pro-independence parties had called for a boycott of the referendum after France had rejected pleas for the vote to be postponed until this year.

When the first community outbreak of the pandemic was recorded in September, a lockdown was imposed, which was extended into October, as thousands contracted the virus and hundreds needed hospital care.

The court in Paris found that the epidemiological situation had improved in October and November and that by the time of the referendum on December 12, more than 77 percent of the population had been vaccinated.

It also said the year-long mourning declared by the Kanak customary Senate in September was not such as to affect the sincerity of the vote.

No minimum turnout
The court added that neither constitutional provisions nor the organic law make the validity of the vote conditional on a minimum turnout.

In the week before the referendum, 146 voters and three organisations filed an urgent submission to the same court, seeking to postpone the vote.

They said given the impact of the pandemic, it was “unthinkable” to proceed with such an important plebiscite.

They said because of the lockdown, campaigning had been unduly hampered as basic freedoms impinged.

However, the court rejected the challenge and voting went ahead as intended by the French government.

Rejecting the referendum outcome, the pro-independence side said apart from court action, it would seek to win the support for its position from the Pacific Islands Forum and the United Nations.

A pro-independence delegate to last month’s UN decolonisation meeting said French President Emmanuel Macron had declared after the referendum that New Caledonia showed it wanted to stay French although it was known that 90 percent of Kanaks wanted independence.

French Senate mission planned
The French Senate is hearing experts this week as its law commission prepares work on a new statute for New Caledonia following last year’s rejection of independence.

The commission, which is chaired by François-Noel Buffet, has also formed a team that will travel to New Caledonia in two weeks for talks with all stakeholders.

The team is expected to stay for a week and complete its work by the end of July.

In December, more than 96 percent voted against independence in the third and last referendum under the Noumea Accord, which had been the decolonisation roadmap since 1998.

However, the pro-independence parties refuse to recognise the result, saying their abstention had rendered the outcome of the process illegitimate.

Paris plans to hold a referendum next June on a new statute for a New Caledonia within the French republic.

Buffet said his mission to Noumea was to consider the institutional situation by consolidating the dialogue initiated by the Matignon and Noumea Accords between France and New Caledonia.

Electoral rolls issue
A key issue will be the fate of the electoral rolls.

The Noumea Accord, whose provisions have been enshrined in the French constitution, restricts voting rights to indigenous people and long-term residents.

Migration this century has added about 40,000 French citizens who remain excluded from referendums and from provincial elections.

The anti-independence parties want the rolls to be unfrozen, but the pro-independence side is strongly opposed to this.

It told the UN Decolonisation Committee that France’s intention to open the electoral rolls to French people who arrived after 1998 was the ultimate weapon to “drown” the Kanak people and “recolonise” New Caledonia.

It warned the Kanaks would be made to disappear, which would not be accepted but inevitably lead to conflict.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Kanak people will not accept France’s attempt to “recolonise” New Caledonia, a pro-independence delegate has told the United Nations.

Addressing a UN Decolonisation Committee seminar on the Pacific in Saint Lucia, Dimitri Qenegei said since 2020 the French President, Emmanuel Macron, and his Overseas Minister Sebastien Lecornu had been taking unilateral decisions.

Qenegei said the signatories to the 1998 Noumea Accord stopped having their annual meetings in 2019 and the date for the referendum on independence last year was set without the consent of the Kanak people.

• READ MORE: Other Kanaky New Caledonia referendum reports

Paris decided to go ahead with the third and last referendum last December under the Noumea Accord despite pleas by the pro-independence camp to delay the vote because of the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on the Kanak people.

France insisted that the timetable for the vote had to be upheld.

Amid a boycott by the pro-independence camp, fewer than half of the voters took part in the referendum but of those who did vote more than 96 percent were in favour of staying with France.

Qenegei said Macron declared after the referendum that New Caledonia showed it wanted to stay French although it was known that 90 percent of Kanaks wanted independence.

Claims of manipulation and lies
To therefore proclaim that New Caledonia chose to stay French was not legitimate, he said, adding that it was a “manipulation and a lie” by France and the heirs of the colonial system.

He said France, as the administrative power, had reorientated its policies to the methods of bygone centuries to hold on to its non-autonomous territories.

Qenegei said France had reneged on its undertaking given in 1998 to accompany New Caledonia to its decolonisation.

He pointed out that in case of three rejections of independence in the referenda under the Noumea Accord, the political parties needed to be convened to discuss the situation.

Qenegei said nowhere did it say that in a case of three “no” votes, New Caledonia remained French.

He said on the international stage, France had been losing influence, which prompted President Macron in 2018 to work towards an Indo-Pacific axis from Paris to Noumea that included India and Australia.

However, he said France suffered a first humiliation when Australia backed out of a multi-billion dollar contract for French submarines.

New Caledonia becoming independent would be another blow to the military axis aimed at containing China, he said.

Parallel drawn with China
Qenegei drew a parallel between China and France, saying France decried the possibility of Chinese troops in Solomon Islands as imperialism while France had placed troops in New Caledonia to “contain the Kanaks”.

While France criticised China’s lending policies, Qenegei said France regarded its loans to New Caledonia, given with interest to be paid, as something different.

Qenegei said the recent French policies were nothing but a return to the source of colonisation.

He warned that France’s intention to open up the electoral rolls to French people who arrived after 1998 was the ultimate weapon to drown the Kanak people and recolonise New Caledonia.

The Kanaks would be made to disappear and that would not be accepted but inevitably lead to conflict.

Qenegei said his outline was not a threat a but a call for help to bring the administrative power to its senses.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Kanak people won’t accept France’s attempt to recolonise New Caledonia, a pro-independence delegate has told the United Nations. https://t.co/UBRq27EyTi

— RNZ Pacific (@RNZPacific) May 17, 2022

RNZ Pacific

A New Caledonian member of the French National Assembly says a consensus needs to be found on Kanaky New Caledonia’s future statute after last month’s referendum saw a third rejection of independence from France.

The vote formally concluded the decolonisation process provided under the 1998 Noumea Accord.

Philippe Gomes, a former New Caledonian territorial president, was speaking in Paris in the first parliamentary debate after the December vote, which had been marked by the boycott of the pro-independence camp determined not to recognise its outcome.

• READ MORE: New Caledonia votes to stay with France, but it’s a hollow victory that will only ratchet up tensions – David Robie
• ‘Secret plots’, sovereignty and covid challenges face Pacific for New Year
• Pacific civil society groups slam New Caledonia ballot as ‘unjust … unfair’
• New Caledonian referendum result rejected – not wish of ‘silent majority’
• Mixed reactions to referendum in Kanak community
• New Caledonian independence referendum – what next?

While 96.5 percent voted against independence, more than 56 percent of the electorate did not take part in the referendum.

Because of the impact of the pandemic on the indigenous Kanak people, the pro-independence parties wanted the vote to be deferred until September this year — after the French presidential election in April, but Paris insisted on the December date.

Gomes said that in the Pacific, political decisions build on consensus, and New Caledonia could become a nation without becoming a state.

He said the anti-independence side expected to remain under the protection of the French state while the rival pro-independence parties want a sovereignty which restored their dignity.

Joint approach needed
Gomes said a joint approach needed to be found to sidestep a process such as referendums.

Speaking on behalf of New Caledonia’s Kanaks, French Polynesian member of the National Assembly Moetai Brotherson said the latest referendum was of “no consequence” to them, and likened the vote to a “recolonisation”.

Rejecting the outcome of the plebiscite as illegitimate, the pro-independence parties last month mounted a court challenge in France, and plan to campaign internationally for its annulment.

Leader of French left-wing party La France Insoumise (LFI – France Unbowed) and candidate for the presidential election Jean-Luc Melenchon said New Caledonia should be maintained for another 10 years under the provisions of the Noumea Accord to avoid any confrontation.

French Overseas Minister Sebastien Lecornu said it would take time to assess the abstention but added that it must be noted that voters had rejected independence three times.

Paris plans to draw up a new statute by June next year and submit it to a vote.

Pro-independence leaders have ruled out any formal negotiations with Paris before this year’s French presidential and legislative elections.

They have also said they would not discuss another statute within the French republic but negotiate independence.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

 

The unfolding in French Polynesia of the latest judiciary entanglements of pro-independence leader Oscar Temaru versus the French administration is being closely followed by members of the Tahitian community in Tahiti and in Aotearoa New Zealand.

There are undeniable similarities between Temaru’s upcoming trial on November 4 in Nouméa after many deferrals, and the expedient trial of Te metua – Pouvana’a a O’opa, the leading figure of the Ma’ohi people, 60 years ago.

Pouvana’a was accused of plotting to burn down Tahiti’s capital Pape’ete, but trumped up charges were made against him because of his fight for an independent Ma’ohi nation.

• READ MORE: 35 years on, Oscar Temaru guest in Rainbow Warrior rewind
• French nuclear tests: ‘I bury people nearly every day, what was our sin?’
• Tahiti’s Temaru challenges court over French judicial ethics

Exiled for 23 years to France after a mockery of a judgment, he was allowed back in Tahiti in 1968 after being pardoned.

Temaru’s judgment has all the makings of a déjà-vu. History is kind enough to remind us about the many disagreements and annoyances caused by Temaru to the French administration spanning more than 50 years:

• Temaru was arrested and jailed for protesting against the nuclear tests in Moruroa
• France’s military intervention in the French Polynesia presidential elections won by Temaru in 2004 for fear of social unrest
• Temaru put French Polynesia back on the UN decolonisation list in 2013, denouncing France’s non-commitment to decolonisation – the politics of the “empty chair” (1)

A string of anti-French actions that have displeased the Paris establishment and, to some extent, the local autonomist government.

So, what has been the straw that broke the camel’s back and why is this new trial so different that the French judicial machine felt justified in seizing money from Temaru’s personal bank account?

Background to the Radio Tefana affair
In June 2020, French prosecutor Herve Leroy seized NZ$145,000 from Temaru’s personal bank account after the former territorial president and current mayor of Faa’a was convicted of exercising undue influence because the court ruled that community Radio Tefana benefited his own pro-independence political party.

According to many lawyers in Tahiti and in France (the CNB – National Council of the Bar), this action suggested that Temaru had already been pre-judged of having “committed a crime” and the presumption of innocence was simply discarded by prosecutor Leroy.

This trial can only be understood as a retaliation against Temaru’s decision in 2018 to take France’s living presidents to the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity over the nuclear weapons tests between 1966 and 1996. This was clearly the last straw for the French political establishment.

Questions related to why the French judiciary could not perform its duty on Tahitian soil but prioritised first the High Council for the Judiciary in France before deciding to send the case to Kanaky New Caledonia remains enigmatic to say the least.

There is overwhelming support for Temaru from the local Tahitian population – from the religious, the social, the political even judicial corners.

As mayor of the most populated district in French Polynesia, he refuses to be intimidated and from our personal communication, he has vowed to take the fight to the highest authority nationally or internationally.

In Nouméa, “our brothers and sisters Kanak”, as he calls them, are ready to welcome us and they will be a tremendous support during the trial – both indigenous people are fighting for their independence from France.

According to a close family member, Temaru is holding on for a trial expected to last 3 days (November 4-7) and has carried out a hunger strike and fasting since his six month suspended sentence and a fine of NZ$66,000 for this affair in 2019 (2) – despite his age at 76.

His fast was also to teach the population a new way of fighting obesity and all the various diseases that it causes. He is not advocating violence and unrest, but he is fighting legally through the courts.

Temaru’s hopes about this trial
At a time when the media is being muzzled and reporters are being silenced worldwide, the voice of the pro-independence community Radio Tefana remains the only and last media platform calling for accountability from both the local Tahitian and French governments.

The hope for Temaru is for a not guilty verdict and for the court to allow the radio to perform its duty of providing public information, especially during this period of covid-19 that has heavily hit his airport town of Faa’a and the capital Pape’ete.

But Temaru questions French justice and will not back down even if it means requesting a meeting with New Zealand’s newly re-elected Prime Minister Jacinda Arden to assist a decolonisation programme that France has so far failed to discuss.

It is also at the back of Temaru’s mind that the decision to move the trial outside of Tahiti was designed and planned by the French judicial authorities to put yet another spanner in the works.

Financially, Temaru will need to meet the cost of an attorney to represent him; Temaru will not be physically able to be present at his own trial as New Caledonia is covid-19 free and has suspended all commercial flights until March 2021.

Popular sympathy might be less in New Caledonia with a bigger French proportion of the population (27 percent) than in French Polynesia (10 percent).

According to Temaru, France has not ceased “to put him on trial” and whatever the outcome this time, France will stick to the same agenda – and so will Temaru.

His fight for independence for the nuna’a Ma’ohi (Ma’ohi people) is a lifelong battle as he celebrates his birthday in Tahiti.

The last fighter of an era
The Tahitian pro-independence leader might be one of the last iconic figures of his generation who sits beside other political leaders, friends and sympathisers alive – or not – of the same era such as Jean-Marie Tjibaou (Kanaky New Caledonia), Walter Lini (Vanuatu), Henry Puna (Cook Islands).

Regardless of the verdict after the judgment, Temaru will be remembered as the force who will still stand up strong like Pouvana’a a O’opa against French neo-colonialism six decades ago.

Ena Manuireva is an Auckland University of Technology academic and PhD candidate who is from Mangareva, one of the French Polynesian islands most affected by the French nuclear tests for three decades until they ended in 1996. He wrote this article especially for the Pacific Media Centre’s Asia Pacific Report.

Notes:
1. France is never at its UN seat when the question of decolonising French Polynesia is on the agenda.
2. In 2019, the current territorial President Édouard Fritch was convicted and condemned for the same amount for arranging for the town administration of Pirae, where he was mayor, to pay for the water supply to the upmarket Erima neighbourhood, where longtime President Gaston Flosse lived.

The campaign for New Caledonia’s referendum on independence from France is already officially three days old with the critical vote in less than two weeks.

Six political formations are registered to campaign for the plebiscite on October 4 when 180,640 voters will be asked whether they want the territory to accede to full sovereignty.

Three groups support independence and three back the status quo.

• READ MORE: Rewind to the 2018 New Caledonia independence referendum

Media campaigns are subject to control by led by the Superior Council of the Audiovisual to ensure plurality and compliance with standards.

In 2018, in the first of three possible referendums under the Noumea Accord, 57 percent voted against independence – much lower than predicted.

If voters again reject independence, a third vote can be called by 2022.

No opinion poll result has been released in the past six months.

New Caledonia was put on the UN decolonisation list in 1986.

This article is republished by the Pacific Media Centre under a partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Pacific Conference of Churches has called for justice in Mā’ohi (French Polynesia) and for Oscar Temaru, the activist mayor of Fa’aa and former territorial president.

In a message read at a protest march in Pape’ete at the weekend, PCC general secretary Reverend James Bhagwan called on France not to ignore Mā’ohi’s re-inscription to the United Nations Decolonisation list.

“Today, we note with concern that France has failed to hear the cry of the people and the voice of the United Nations,” Reverend Bhagwan said.

READ MORE: Oscar Temaru’s challenge over colonlai justice

“This refusal makes a mockery of France’s national motto – Liberté, égalité, fraternité (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity).”

Reverend Bhagwan said the recent arrest of “freedom fighter” Oscar Temaru appeared to be linked to his role in bringing about the re-inscription of Mā’ohi at the UN.

Mā’ohi was reinscripted seven years ago to the UN Decolonisation List after strong international advocacy aided by the PCC. The full PCC statement said:

PCC statement
“Justice For Mā’ohi , Justice for Temaru

“As the people of Mā’ohi (French Polynesia) remember the seventh year of their reinscription on the United Nations decolonisation list, the Pacific Conference of Churches calls on France to act with justice.

“France has ignored the wishes of the Mā’ohi people and the United Nations for their inalienable right to hold an act of self-determination.

“Seven years ago, the Pacific churches supported the Etaretia Porotetani Mā’ohi (Mā’ohi Protestant Church) in the process of re-inscription and has joined the EPM as a petitioner at both the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonisation (C-24) as well as the UN Special Political and Decolonisation Committee (Fourth Committee).

“Today, we note with concern that France has failed to hear the cry of the people and the voice of the United Nations. This refusal makes a mockery of France’s national motto – Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity).

“The Pacific churches also call on France to allow the people of Mā’ohi a voice on their political future by holding a referendum, similar to the political process in Kanaky (New Caledonia).’

“The recent arrest of freedom fighter, Oscar Temaru, appears to be linked to his role in bringing about the re-inscription of Mā’ohi at the UN.

“Temaru is in court over allegations on the misuse of public funds in Fa’aa where he is mayor. The courts have also ordered the seizure of US$100,000 of Temaru’s savings.

“The courts must never be used as a tool for political expediency or revenge against opponents. Our courts must act impartially as instruments of a legal system which is fair and just, not prejudiced and oppressive.

“We call for Temaru to be treated justly. We remind France that it has yet to bring about just reparation for the thousands of people – including French civilians and service personnel – crippled and debilitated by the fallout from nuclear tests at Fangataufa and Moruroa.

“And we call on the people of the Pacific to pray for the Mā’ohi church and justice for all in the region who face tyranny and injustice from their leaders.

“In the name of Christ and in the service of a just, peaceful and free Pacific.”

Reverend James S, Bhagwan
General Secretary
Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC)
Suva, Fiji