DATE=6/8/2000
TYPE=U-S OPINION ROUNDUP
TITLE=TROUBLE IN PARADISE
NUMBER=6-11861
BYLINE=ANDREW GUTHRIE
DATELINE=WASHINGTON
EDITOR=ASSIGNMENTS
TELEPHONE=619-3335
INTERNET=YES
CONTENT=
INTRO: Most people view the islands of the South
Pacific as a tropical paradise, filled with endless
sandy beaches and azure seas. In the past few weeks,
that idyllic view has been shattered by a pair of
violent coups on two island chains that have raised
the specter of racism.
We turn now to ___________ for U-S press reaction to
coup d'etats in Fiji and the Solomon Islands, the
subject of today's U-S Opinion Roundup.
TEXT: Within the past three weeks, two armed groups
of men have taken over the parliaments of a pair of
former British commonwealth island groups, Fiji, and
the Solomon Islands. The first coup came in Fiji,
when an ethnic Fijian businessman, George Speight, and
a small band of armed men invaded the parliament
building in Suva, the capital, taking Fiji's first
ethnic Indian prime minister, Mahendra Chaudhry, along
with most of his cabinet, hostage.
They are still holding most of the hostages, and Mr.
Speight is ignoring international protests for their
release. He says he's purging Fiji's government of
ethnic Indians, descendents of imported Indian sugar
plantation workers. It is the Fijians of Indian
descent who control the majority of Fiji's business
and commerce, but not the government. Ethnic tensions
between the two groups are nothing new. A previous
military coup over the same issue took place in 1987.
About three weeks after the Fiji coup, another group
of disgruntled native people seized Bartholomew
Ulufa'alu, prime minister of the Solomon Islands.
The U-S press is especially upset by the nature of the
clash in Fiji, pitting as it does, the indigenous
Fijians who are mostly of Melanesian descent, against
the more recently arrived Fijians of Indian descent.
We begin our sampling in America's own Pacific Ocean
State, Hawaii. The Honolulu Star Bulletin says that
the coup in Fiji will not only harm "relations between
the Indians and the indigenous Melanesians" but it
will also "set back the cause of democracy."
VOICE: Relations between Fiji's indigenous
Melanesians and Asian Indians ... have long been
tense. In 1987, a Melanesian army colonel, Sitiveni
Rabuka, led a coup that deposed an Indian-dominated
government and went on to serve as prime minister
until a year ago. ... [In April] thousands of
Melanesians marched through Suva, the capital,
charging that [Prime Minister] Chaudhry favored the
Indians and demanding his resignation. [Mr.] Chaudhry
responded by banning future protests. Now, in an
apparent reprise of the 1987 coup, the prime minister
and his cabinet [have been] ... taken hostage ... The
coup is a grave setback for democracy and interracial
relations in Fiji ... a leader among south Pacific
nations. Washington should apply pressure on the coup
leaders to abandon this misguided effort and restore
constitutional government.
TEXT: The nation's preeminent business daily, the
Wall Street Journal, says the old stereotype of the
South Pacific simply doesn't fit today's facts.
VOICE: Toss out those old copies of National
Geographic that depict the islands of the South
Pacific as amiable outposts ... Nothing could be
further from today's truth. Paradise, in fact, is
going to the dogs. In ... Fiji and the Solomon
Islands, armed thugs asserting ethnic claims have
taken the prime ministers hostage. In Fiji, Prime
Minister Mahendra Chaudhry was imprisoned in the
parliament building on May 19th ... His counterpart in
the Solomon Islands, Bartholomew Ulufa'alu, was seized
just as unceremoniously, by rebel gunmen [about two
weeks later] ... Fiji is ... a compelling study in how
fomenting racial hyper-consciousness can be a
disastrous business. ... in Fiji (or the Solomon
Islands), the outcome is likely to be calamitous. ...
The Indo-Fijian population is not the "enemy."
TEXT: And lastly, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette urges
readers to pay careful attention to what is happening
in Fiji.
VOICE: Although it is unfolding in a small, idyllic
place far from the United States, the coup being
staged in Fiji should not be dismissed as an isolated
comic-opera affair. Its cause is distressingly
familiar -- racism -- and its poisonous example of
violence has now been followed elsewhere
TEXT: With that, we come to the end of this sampling
of U-S press opinion on the two coups underway in a
pair of small, South Pacific island nations.
NEB/ANG/KL
08-Jun-2000 14:35 PM EDT (08-Jun-2000 1835 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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