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| Subject: Policing Papua New Guinea's 'raskols' | |
Author: David (Australia) | [ Next Thread |
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] Date Posted: 11:00:57 12/11/04 Sat By Nick Squires BBC, Port Moresby Australia is sending nearly 300 police and public officials to its former colony Papua New Guinea, as part of an ambitious five year mission to try to stamp out rampant crime and corruption. But this deployment is not without its risks. PNG exports are gold, petroleum, copper, coffee, palm oil and logs Founded by a British adventurer in 1873, Port Moresby commands spectacular views of the Coral Sea and a mosaic of bays, islands and headlands. But the sweet-smelling frangipani trees and bright red splashes of bougainvillea which dot the hillsides, fail to mask a city in crisis. Two-thirds of the population lives in makeshift shanty towns and unemployment stands at around 70%. In the 29 years since Papua New Guinea gained independence from Australia, the country has gone backwards in almost every respect, from health and education to corruption and crime. Expatriates and middle class Papua New Guineans live behind high walls and coils of razor wire, more reminiscent of Johannesburg than the South Pacific. The residential compound in which Australian diplomatic staff live, is so formidably protected that locals have nicknamed it "Fortress Fear". 'Raskols' At the heart of the crime epidemic, which has made Port Moresby one of the most dangerous cities in the world, are gangs of armed criminals known as "raskols". The first wave of deployment saw 44 Assisting Australian Police (AAP) officers on the streets The word rascal normally conjures up images of naughty school boys. But in the Pidgin English spoken by people in PNG, it denotes something much more sinister. Far from being loveable rogues, raskols are violent thugs. They are notorious for robberies, rapes and armed hold-ups, not just in Port Moresby but across the country. Locals tell stories of raskols holding up minibuses in broad daylight, robbing the passengers of their wallets and watches and then raping the women one by one. Tackling these gangs will be one of the biggest challenges for the 210 Australian police who are being deployed to Papua New Guinea. Last week they conducted their first foot patrol, in Port Moresby's biggest market, notorious for pickpockets and thieves. Dodging wheezing buses and stray dogs, they were quickly surrounded by dozens of jubilant, welcoming locals. "It's very good the Australians are here," one woman told me. "The PNG police are corrupt and violent. We're just as scared of them as we are of the raskols." The Australians immediately endeared themselves to the locals by trying out some of the Pidgin they had learned during a week of intensive language training. "Ever since we arrived 10 days ago people have been coming up to us, shaking our hands," said Sergeant Ian Hudson, from Brisbane, whose previous overseas postings include East Timor, Fiji and Cyprus. New enemy Across the city, in Port Moresby's oldest-established shanty town, a group of raskols considered their response to the arrival of the Australian police. The only way to survive is to hold up buses and snatch bags Gang member They do not hate their former colonisers, they insisted. But if the Australians confront them during a robbery or a carjacking, they will not hesitate to open fire. "Raskols shoot at the PNG police all the time, so they'll do the same thing to the white cops," said 35-year-old Rocky Murray. He showed me the bullet wounds he sustained four years ago when an armed robbery turned into a fire fight with local police. One bullet went through his leg, and a second through his arm. Another remains lodged in his skull, leaving him blind in one eye. The deployment is part of Australia's new role as peacekeeper in the South Pacific Three of his gang members and two policemen were shot dead during the clash. "Life is hard" said another raskol, pointing to the surrounding open sewers, pot-holed roads and corrugated iron shacks. "The only way to survive is to hold up buses and snatch bags. If the Australians confront us, we will shoot." Senior Australian police are uncomfortable discussing the likelihood of casualties. They say their officers will be able to use a range of options - including batons and capsicum spray - before having to draw their 9mm semi-automatic pistols. But in a city where violent crime is a regular occurrence, some sort of confrontation seems inevitable. The risk will increase over the next few months as the Australian police deploy to other towns, including Mount Hagen in PNG's rugged highlands, which has been wracked by tribal fighting. Twenty years ago, the tribes fought each other with bows and arrows; now they use M16 assault rifles. The deployment to Papua New Guinea is the latest sign of Canberra's determination to act as the peacekeeper of the Pacific. For decades Australia was sensitive to charges of neo-colonialism, and allowed its Pacific neighbours to forge their own futures and make their own mistakes. But the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States, the Bali bombings a year later and the increasingly parlous state of some island nations, prompted a dramatic rethink. The fear is that failed or failing states could be exploited by international criminals, people-smugglers or terrorists. Over the next few months it will become clear whether Australia's latest foray into the South Pacific heralds a new era of peace and progress, or the start of another bloody chapter in Papua New Guinea's troubled history. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| [> Subject: If this is neo-colonialism, so be it | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 12:18:32 12/11/04 Sat When Whitlam was in power, Australia determined that it could not bear to be seen as a colonial power, so we left PNG in a tearing hurry, without hanging around long enough to prepare the country's leaders and institutions for self-government. What we left behind doesn't work, has never worked and shows no signs of spontaneously beginning to work. Good government does not seem to happen by chance. When I was in PNG a decade ago, I was surprised at how many people told me they resented Australia’s treatment of their country: not that we had been the evil colonial ruler, but that we had cut and run without giving them the chance to learn how to do things well for themselves. If we are so mortally afraid of being called neo-colonialists, then I guess we will just have to leave the people of PNG to suffer in chaos. If, on the other hand, we accept EITHER our historical responsibility as part of the creation of the problem, OR the simple humanitarian need for good government in PNG, OR the imperatives of our own national security, then we will have to swallow our pride and help out. If we just keep the violence under control for our own benefit, then call us the evil Western country that uses others as pawns to serve its own interests. If we help create the stability that is necessary for development, so that the people of PNG will have the chance to build a life where they are not condemned to perpetual poverty and a diet of rice and tinned mackerel, if we hang around long enough to help the people get governance right in a way that works for them, then call us the good guys, neo-colonial or not. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> Subject: Approach to decolonisation... | |
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Author: Paddy (Scotland) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 20:58:35 12/11/04 Sat In Britain's African colonies there was an attempt to build a middle class before giving independence - contrast this with Portugal's withdrawal from all of her colonies within two months in 1975. I do not know what Australia's policies were in the run-up to withdrawal from PNG but it is appropriate to offer NOW to PNG any help that can be given, especially as the PNG govt has asked for it. If a sovreign government invites advisors in from another country it is not Neo-colonialism if that other country accepts. Similar initiatives are taking place in the Solomons, Jamaica and Belize all at the invitation of their governments. Neo-colonialism would be more like: occupying Zimbabwe because in our (the West's) opinion the Government there is not fit to govern any longer. My point: offering help to countries that badly need it and ask for it is far from shameful. Neo-colonialism is not at all the same as getting involved by invitation. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> Subject: Dangerous territory | |
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Author: Ed Harris (Venezia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 21:10:19 12/11/04 Sat In Africa, one of the things which has driven the continent down a dry path towards indigence and starvation was our change of policy - at American insistence, naturally - from the traditional mode of working with native elites and modernising them, and moving towards the co-operation with the lucky few who had been at the LSE in the 1930s and had imbibed a lot of garbage about centralisation, buying cartels, direction of the economy by committees of 'experts', and all the usual socialist schreklichkeit, which left Africa in the 1960s with a ready-made structure for totalitarian rule. West Africa is a case in point. I would be careful before suggesting that cultivating a middle class before independence was a positive step, since I can think of no occasion in which this admittedly sensible policy was actually carried out in a sensible way. Other than that, I quite agree with your remarks: invitation is a far cry from occupation. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> Subject: Yes but... | |
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Author: Paddy (Scotland) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 21:53:45 12/11/04 Sat Every function of government in the Portugese colonies from top to bottom was carried out by a Portuguese official, even very minor jobs in railway stations etc... All that the blacks were used for was in ultra-cheap labour. At the docks in Mozambique the workers were not even issued with boots while manhandling shipping crates - this in the early 1970s! When the revolution came about in Portugal it was decided to clear out of the Colonies as quickly as possible (presumably the revolutionaries were worried about a potential counter revolution). When they left there were no people able to fill-up the civil service positions that were vacant and the rest of the population was (and is now) largely ignorant. This is visible in all economic data published on the former Portugese colonies in Africa. The rough figure of GDP per head in Mozambique is ~ US$200 annually and Angola has ~US$750 annually. In Britain the approach was to educate the Africans so that they could fulfil functions greater than lifting and carrying. When the UK gave independence to its African colonies there were people in these new nations who were capable of filling civil-service positions required for a western structure of government. I fully agree that the Soviet Socialist Republic of the LSE has a lot to answer for but looking at an example that has worked beautifully and benefitted from the British approach is Botswana. As a comparison the FCO gives the annual GDP per head of this genuinely democratic African nation as US$5,502 (2004), around seven times that of Angola and a staggering twenty-five times that of Mozambique. To put these figures into context, many of the new EU countries have a GDP per head that is less than this. This difference is more what I meant by the establishment of a middle class. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Fair enough | |
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Author: Ed Harris (Venezia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 01:10:57 12/12/04 Sun I suppose that I was thinking about preparing ruling classes for government whereas what you were actually talking about were the nuts-and-bolts professions which make a country work, in which context you are certainl right. Botswana really is a great success story, and more should be made of it. It is peaceful, democratic, free from ethnic violence (and not just between different African tribes, because the Indians were never kicked out of Bechuanaland as was the case in much of British Africa and they live there still) and relatively prosperous. Bravo. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> Subject: PNG independence | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 00:48:41 12/12/04 Sun PNG was given independence on 16 September 1975, after Mozambique but before Angola. I rather suspect that Whitlam wanted it off his hands quickly so that he wouldn't be seen as the last of the colonial rulers. I quite agree that helping on invitation is not neo-colonialism: the problem is that some people get very squeamish about it. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> Subject: PNG did become a Realm of the Crown | |
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Author: Jim (Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 14:56:16 12/11/04 Sat [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> Subject: Papua New Guinea 'set to implode' | |
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Author: David (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 09:51:20 12/14/04 Tue By Phil Mercer BBC News, Sydney Papua New Guinea is heading towards economic and social collapse and could be overrun by criminals, a new Australian report warns. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute called for the global community to radically increase the amount of aid given to the country. It said Australia should take over some aspects of government. The Australian Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, is heading to Papua New Guinea for bilateral meetings. The report warns that if Papua New Guinea's weaknesses are allowed to continue, the country could fall "off a cliff into full-scale state failure". The central government's authority would collapse and criminals would dominate the economy, it says. This gloomy assessment says serious decline is already well under way. 'Bleak economic outlook' The study found that Papua New Guinea's weak government and policing had allowed international crime gangs to relocate from South East Asia in recent years. The report's authors said that as Papua New Guinea's problems got worse, the risk of them spreading around the region increased. They urge Australia to more than double its aid budget and take control of PNG's immigration and customs services. The country has rich supplies of minerals and timber, but the economic outlook is extremely bleak for its population of five-and-a-half-million people. The rapid spread of HIV and Aids is putting further pressure on the authorities. Australia has begun sending a total of 210 police officers and more than 60 bureaucrats to its troubled neighbour as part of a multi-million dollar rescue package. Mr Downer will hold talks on security with his counterparts in Papua New Guinea as part of his annual tour of the South Pacific. It will include stop-overs in the Solomon Islands, New Caledonia and New Zealand. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> Subject: The deep mess of PNG demands long-term action | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 14:22:10 12/14/04 Tue The deep mess of PNG demands long-term action Hugh White Sydney Morning Herald December 15, 2004 The Howard Government has shown it is willing to do more to help Papua New Guinea than Australia has done in the past. But if we want to have a real chance of helping to pull PNG out of its long, sad slide towards state failure, we are going to need to do a lot more, and to do it very differently. And we need to start soon, because time is running out. Today in Lae at the annual PNG-Australia ministerial forum, an impressive line up of ministers, led by Alexander Downer, will meet their PNG counterparts to talk about the future of the relationship. They have some good news to celebrate. After a year of legal and political wrangling, the Enhanced Co-operation Program agreed at last year's forum has got into gear. Two weeks ago, the first Australian police went on the beat in PNG to help address the country's endemic law and order problems. But let's be realistic. Two hundred or so Australian police will not turn PNG into a safe and law-abiding country. At any time there will be fewer than a dozen on the beat. And the problems of policing in PNG go very deep - it's not just a question of too few police with too few skills. Go to the average police station in PNG and you will see what I mean. Many have no phones and no vehicles. Pay is irregular and housing is atrocious. This is because a deeply dysfunctional system of government lacks the administrative capacity and budget discipline to spend the money that should be available effectively. The same problems afflict most other sectors of government. The problems in policing, as in education, health care, road maintenance and economic policy, are symptoms of a much deeper weakness in the institutions of government in PNG. And the weakness of the state is in turn a symptom of something even deeper - a weak sense of nationhood. The idea of PNG as a nation and a state has never struck deep roots with its population. Without a sense of a shared national interest among voters, a vibrant but chaotic democracy cannot deliver responsible government. And it sets up a corrosive cycle of disenchantment and despair. PNG's weak government does little for its people, so there is no reason for them to offer it commitment in return. Politicians come to see politics as a form of business. The resulting corruption and maladministration make people even more cynical about their country. These problems have deep roots. They were there before independence in 1975, when people who cared deeply about PNG, like this newspaper's Peter Hastings, warned that a weak sense of nationhood would undermine its future. And they are shared with other countries, in the South Pacific and beyond, in which the structures of the nation-state have been grafted onto societies with no previous experience of statehood. What can Australia do to help PNG? We know that aid alone cannot be the answer. Australia has poured money into PNG for 30 years, and it has done a lot to slow the country's decline and help its people. But traditional aid cannot build the institutional and psychological infrastructure of a functioning state. The Government's Pacific Aid Strategy, published last week, speaks of "a fundamental shift" to "a more hands-on approach", which sounds like a step in the right direction. The Government seems to understand how deep-seated PNG's problems are. But the measures it proposes are rather timid - more advisers, more technical assistance, more support for accountability. If Australia is serious about helping PNG to pull out of its painful decline, we need to find ways to help it tackle the deeper problems of a weak state and a weak nation. We have no alternative but to try, because there is no reason to believe PNG can turn itself around without a lot of help. There is no model for how one country can help another in this way. However, we can identify some basic principles. It's going to take a long time - not in years, but in generations. We need to work with PNG and its leaders, not against them. To do that we need to build a deeper and more trusting relationship - to strengthen the government-to-government relationship but also rebuild the wider links between Papua New Guineans and Australians. We need to take a comprehensive approach that helps PNG address service delivery, central administration, economic development, constitutional issues, political processes and national identity. So the two countries need to work together to conceive, construct and deliver a long-term agenda that can build PNG's economy, the state and the nation. And we need to start by rebuilding the bilateral relationship. The way to begin is for the two governments to agree to set this ambitious goal for the relationship, and to consult widely on both sides of Torres Strait to bring it about. Australia's interests and responsibilities in our immediate neighbourhood have always been at the heart of John Howard's foreign policy, and his actions in Bougainville, East Timor and the Solomon Islands. PNG confronts him, and the rest of us, with our biggest challenge. There is little place for poetry in foreign policy, but the poet James McAuley was on to something when he said: "I have felt that New Guinea would be a test of our quality as a nation: that something worthwhile could be created there; and on the other hand that failure could come through lack of foresight, sympathy and clear principles of action." ======================================== Hugh White is a visiting fellow at the Lowy Institute, and professor of strategic studies at ANU. He is co-author of Strengthening Our Neighbour, a report on the future of our relationship with PNG, published yesterday by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> Subject: PNG push to open up (Australian) job market - note the interesting comments about Rugby | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 14:31:05 12/14/04 Tue PNG push to open up job market Mark Forbes in Lae and Cynthia Banham Sydney Morning Herald December 15, 2004 Papua New Guinea will call for an Australian open-door policy for its workers and an expansion of the new $1.1 billion program to restore law and order in annual ministerial talks today. Senior PNG ministers will request short-term visas for seasonal workers and longer-term access for professionals in an effort to boost their economy and strengthen ties with Australia. Arriving in Lae yesterday, the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer, said Australian ministers would examine the next steps for the "historic" program that is sending 210 police and 64 public servants to PNG's trouble spots. Measures to "promote growth and stability" would also be considered, he said. The delegation includes the Defence Minister, Robert Hill, the Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, the Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, and the Justice Minister, Chris Ellison. The talks follow yesterday's release of an Australian Strategic Policy Institute report on the PNG relationship, which warned Australia's closest neighbour could disintegrate into a series of "lawless and unviable mini-states". It urged closer ties with PNG, up to $500 million a year in extra assistance and backed opening Australia's job market to workers from PNG. One of the report's authors, Hugh White, said the country was Australia's most difficult foreign policy challenge and potentially posed a high security threat. Senior PNG sources confirmed its delegation, headed by the Foreign Minister, Sir Rabbie Namaliu, would push for seasonal access for agricultural workers, in the same way European backpackers can find jobs in Australia. The report also suggested including a couple of PNG teams in Australia's National Rugby League competition. The recommendation was based on the institute's assessment that PNG's lack of a national identity is one of its deepest problems. The report said rugby league, which is popular in PNG, could foster a greater sense of nationalism if broadcast nationally. Australia gives PNG almost $500 million a year under the Enhanced Co-operation Program. Warning of increasing trans-national crime in PNG, and a looming AIDS crisis, which, if left unchecked, could become as bad East Africa's, the institute said "central government authority in PNG could collapse" within 10 or 15 years if Australia did not act. "Politics and the economy could be dominated by criminals, and the rule of law and respect for human rights could disappear. HIV/AIDS could reach catastrophic proportions. Health and education services could cease to exist," the report warned. PNG's Police Minister, Bire Kimisopa, said he would call for an extension to the $1.1 billion program to rebuild the police. "I fear that after five years we may realise what we negotiated was too little, too late," he said. Mr Kimisopa wants a one-off payment from Australia of $2 million for a police retrenchment package and $5 million for a forensics unit. PNG will also call on Australia to back a planned liquified natural gas pipeline to Queensland. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> Subject: 'No magic wand for PNG's ills' | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 13:57:51 12/15/04 Wed 'No magic wand for PNG's ills' Mark Forbes in Lae Sydney Morning Herald December 16, 2004 Australia's $1.1 billion, five-year plan to restore law and order to Papua New Guinea could be extended for much longer, according to the Foreign Minister, Alexander Downer. Following annual talks between 18 ministers from the two countries, Mr Downer said yesterday that placing 210 Australian police and 64 public servants into key positions would not be a magic wand for PNG's problems. And it was too early to tell whether the program needed to be expanded. "Whether it's going to last for five years or much longer, we will know nearer the time," he said. The Immigration Minister, Amanda Vanstone, announced that Australia would consider allowing PNG citizens to obtain working holiday visas, in response to the country's calls for access to the Australian job market. And further increasing Australian assistance, the Defence Minister, Robert Hill, announced that four Australian officers would be placed in senior positions within PNG's defence force to drive reform. The lieutenant-colonels would start taking up their positions next month. These include the deputy commander of training and deputy commander of logistics. Mr Downer warned that despite last week's introduction of Australian police onto the streets of Port Moresby, the program faced a "long, hard road", with a need for long-term structural reform. But an Australian think tank's warning that PNG could disintegrate into several lawless states was misinformed and destructive, the country's Foreign Minister, Sir Rabbie Namaliu, said. However, Mr Downer described the analysis of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute as "a credible piece of work". On Tuesday night the office of the PNG Prime Minister, Sir Michael Somare, distributed a statement from his son and Government MP, Arthur Somare, alleging the report indicated Australia was gearing up to interfere in PNG's internal affairs. "The Australian Government relies on such outrageous claims to support their current policy of intervention into the Pacific," he said. The Prime Minister, John Howard, was emulating US President George Bush and taking an imperialist approach, Mr Somare said. The Federal Government funds the institute, which is its main think tank on foreign and defence affairs. The institute's call for police intervention in the Solomon Islands was credited with prompting the Australian-led intervention last year. The new report, "Strengthening our Neighbour", urges closer ties and up to $500 million a year in additional assistance. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |