Threats by Fiji's military commander to force the government of the racially divided nation to resign must be taken seriously, New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said yesterday.
Reports in Fiji on Tuesday quoted military commander Voreqe Bainimarama as saying the military would force Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase's government to resign if it did not withdraw controversial legislation.
The military has been at odds with Qarase over a planned law to offer amnesties to the plotters of a 2000 coup, as well as a separate bill to transfer control of coastal foreshores and waters to local indigenous communities.
Bainimarama, who came close to losing his life in a military mutiny associated with the 2000 coup, last year threatened to overthrow the government if it passed the amnesty legislation.
The Fiji Times reported yesterday Bainimarama as saying he stood by the comments he made earlier this week.
Clark warned that although he had been quieter since national elections in May, Bainimarama should not be taken lightly.
"This comes a bit out of the blue and I don't think we can just say well, it's nothing, it's just rumbling," Clark told Radio New Zealand.
New Zealand had to be concerned when the threats against the government were being repeated by Bainimarama and when there was "quite a lot of evidence" of intent to carry them out, she said.
Bainimarama, who was in the Middle East inspecting Fijian troops, was quoted as saying on Tuesday in the Fiji Times that the army did not need any special powers to demand the government's resignation.
"And we don't have to take over because the military will walk into the office of the prime minister and demand his resignation," he added.
"If the people want us to do this, we will do it. At this stage Fiji needs good governance and the military will demand for their resignation. There is nothing illegal about this," he said.
"If government can't do the right thing then [it should] resign because they have introduced policies and bills that are only taking the country backwards and not forward," the paper quoted him as saying.
Mahendra Chaudhry was overthrown as Fiji's first ethnic Indian prime minister in the May 2000 coup, which ended when Bainimarama arrested key plotters.
Clark, Australian Prime Minister John Howard and leaders from 14 island countries are sacheduled to meet in Fiji's tourist center of Nadi next week for the Pacific Islands Forum.
The forum looked likely to be overshadowed by deteriorating relations between Australia and Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, as well as the instability in Fiji.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not