A weekly wrap-up of news, issues and current affairs from the Pacific. The programme is broadcast nationwide every Saturday evening on Radio New Zealand National and is produced by the newsroom of Radio New Zealand International. The following rundown is supplied from the broadcaster’s news system:
1. A violent rampage by Papua New Guinea soldiers on a University Campus has highlighted the breakdown in discipline and control within the country's defence Force.
2. Tonga Police say a deep seated rivalry between two schools that goes back decades, has escalated to extreme levels after two students were left hospitalised following an attack.
3. A humanitarian aid mission is underway in Kiribati to improve its infrastructure so the nation can free up more resources for disaster preparedness.
4. More charges have been laid in French Polynesia over the 1997 disappearance of a local journalist, Jean-Pascal Couraud, known as JKP.
5. Uncertainty still surrounds the whereabouts of the former Northern Marianas Governor Benigno Fitial following the dramatic collapse of his political career earlier this year.
6. As a possible re-opening of the Panguna copper and gold mine in the Papua New Guinea province of Bougainville looms one vested interest group is signalling its not happy with talk of compensation being sought.
7. The United Front for a Democratic Fiji has strongly criticised Melanesian Spearhead Group member governments for supporting Fiji's military-led regime.
8. The head of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community says larger countries like Papua New Guinea might be able to reach the stage of not relying at all on international aid, but have to work on using cleaner fossil fuels.
9. Vanuatu has imposed a year-long moratorium on international researchers to allow for a stock-take of all research taking place in the country.