Latest news with #NewCaledonia
ABC News
21-07-2025
- Entertainment
- ABC News
Guam becomes staging ground for largest US Air Force exercise in history
On the program today Guam is transformed into a key staging ground for the largest U.S. Air Force exercise in history. New Caledonia's pro-independence leaders meet for the first time since the signing of the historic Bougival accord. A new search commences to find the remains of hundreds of South Sea Islanders who died in a north Queensland hospital in the late 1800s. A survey finds 91 per cent of children in Samoa have experienced some form of violent discipline. Fiji Tourism revives beloved Hollywood volleyball Wilson as part of its latest campaign. The British and Irish Lions have travel to Melbourne to face the First Nations and Pasifika XV ahead of their match with the Wallabies. And LGBTQIA+ youth gather together to showcase their ballroom debut in Fugalei, Apia.
ABC News
16-07-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
Private vehicles banned in violence-ridden Enga Province ahead of by-election
On the program today Police in Papua New Guinea take extraordinary measures ahead of a by-election in a violence-prone part of the country's highlands by banning the movement of all private vehicles. The month-long campaign period for Samoa's snap general election kicks off ahead of polling day on August 29. Optimism flows on the streets of New Caledonia as people digest the news of a historic agreement signed between France and local political parties on the territory's political future. The dismissal of a landmark climate case in the Torres Straight Islands draws attention to the limitations of the law of negligence. A competition breaks out between rugby league powerbrokers and Port Moresby officials over which stadium will serve as the PNG NRL team's home ground. And it's an all an all Melanesian affair at the 20-25 OFC Women's Nations Cup final.
RNZ News
16-07-2025
- Sport
- RNZ News
OFC Professional League will revolutionlise football in the Pacific
OFC Men's Champions League 2025. Photo: Shane Wenzlick / Former FIFA World Cup winner Christian Karembeu believes the new Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) Professional League will be the critical next step to close the gap between the Pacific with the rest of the world. Karembeu told OFC Media that after witnessing Auckland City's extraordinary performance against Argentina's Boca Juniors at the recent 2025 FIFA Club World Cup , that the introduction of professional football around Oceania will be a game-changer. "The new Pro League will be a revolution for our region," the New Caledonia-born midfielder, who lifted the FIFA World Cup with France and the Champions League trophy with Real Madrid, said. He said the Pacific is blessed with incredibly natural athletes and feels that the new OFC Pro League, with professional coaches and managers, could quickly develop Oceania's amateur players into world-beaters. "Just look at the All Blacks, who have given athletes from Tonga, Samoa and Fiji the chance to develop in their amazing environment and have reaped the benefits of turning that raw talent into rugby superstars," he said.. Photo: Oceania Football Confederation Karembeu points at his own success, as well as former Socceroos legend Tim Cahill, and more recently All Whites midfielder Marko Stamenic, as players with Pacific Island heritage to perform well at the highest stage. The former Real Madrid star said the Pacific players have always had the talent, but never the appropriate guidance to teach them what is expected from a professional player. "They will be educated how to train, how to recover, how to eat, about intensity and quality, and when you can go out or need to stay at home," he said. "Players need to learn how to create a routine and clubs need experts to show them the way to be a professional." He added the new teams will need quality managers, coaches and experts in human resources, accommodation and transport and anything else required to run a professional sports organisation. "When you are an amateur player, you can do whatever you want," he said. "But when you are in a professional league and professional club, you have to behave like that. If you do not want to make those sacrifices, you do not belong, so it all comes down to discipline." Karembeu said Pacific players have grown up to be respectful and humble, which will help them make the transition into the professional game. "But they will also not be intimidated, because in the islands we are all warriors. "They will just have to realise in the professional environment many players will be better than them, so they have to humble, observe and learn to become better players." Karembeu said coaches or clubs with a European background need to understand the cultural background of the players to get the best out of them, before they discard a player out of ignorance or misunderstanding. -OFC
RNZ News
16-07-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
New Caledonia's politicians to get police protection following death threats
Demonstration in support New Caledonia against the unfreezing of the electoral body, Place de la Republique, in Paris. 25 May 2024. Photo: AFP / Fiora Garenzi / Hans Lucas New Caledonian politicians who inked their commitment to a deal with France on 12 July will be offered special police protection, following threats uttered especially on social networks. The group to benefit from such measures includes almost twenty members of New Caledonia's parties, both pro-France and pro-independence, who took part in deal-breaking negotiations with the French State that ended on 12 July 2025, and a joint commitment regarding New Caledonia's political future. The endorsed document envisages a roadmap in the coming months to turn New Caledonia into a "State", but within the French realm. It is what some legal experts have sometimes referred to as "a State within the State", while others saying this was tantamount to pushing the French Constitution to its very limits. The document is a commitment by all signatories that, from now on, they will stick to their respective positions. The tense but conclusive negotiations took place behind closed doors in a hotel in the small city of Bougival, near Paris, under talks driven by French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls and a team of high-level French government representatives and advisors. It followed Valls's several unsuccessful attempts, earlier this year, to reach a consensus between parties who want New Caledonia to remain part of France and others representing the pro-independence movement. Left to right: pro-France leaders Sonia Backès, Nicolas Metzdorf, Gil Brial with FLNKS chief negotiator Emmanuel Tjibaou Photo: Nicolas Metzdorf But to reach a compromise agreement, both sides have had to make concessions. The pro-French parties, for instance, have had to endorse the notion of a State of New Caledonia or that of a double French-New Caledonian nationality. Pro-independence parties have had to accept the plan to modify the rules of eligibility to vote at local elections so as to allow more non-native French nationals to join the local electoral roll. They also had to postpone or even give up on the hard-line full sovereignty demand for now. Over the past five years and after a series of three referendums (held between 2018 and 2021) on self-determination, both camps have increasingly radicalised. This resulted in destructive and deadly riots that broke out in May 2024, resulting in 14 deaths, over €2 billion in material damage, thousands of jobless and the destruction of hundreds of businesses. Over one year later, the atmosphere in New Caledonia remains marked by a sense of tension, fear, uncertainty on both sides of the political chessboard. Since the deal was signed and made public, on 12 July, and even before flying back to New Caledonia, all parties have been targeted by a wide range of reactions from their militant bases, especially on social media. Some of the reactions have included thinly-veiled death threats in response to a perception that, on one side or another, the deal was not up to the militants' expectations and that the parties' negotiators were now regarded as "traitors". Since signing the Paris agreement, all parties have also recognised the need to "sell" and "explain" the new agreement to their respective militants. Most of the political parties represented during the talks have already announced they will hold meetings in the coming days, in what is described as "an exercise in pedagogy". "In a certain number of countries, when you sign compromises after hundreds of hours of discussions and when it's not accepted (by your militants), you lose your reputation. In our can risk your life", moderate pro-France Calédonie Ensemble leader Philippe Gomès, who was part of the negotiations, told public broadcaster Nouvelle-Calédonie La Première on Wednesday. Pro-independence FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front) chief negotiator Emmanuel Tjibaou, as early as Saturday 12 July, was the first to envision negative repercussions back in New Caledonia. "To choose this difficult and new path also means we'll be subject to criticism. We're going to get insulted, threatened, precisely because we have chosen a different path", he told a post-signing debrief meeting hosted by French President Emmanuel Macron. In 1988, Tjibaou's father, pro-independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou, also signed a historic deal (known as the "Matignon-Oudinot accords" with pro-France's Jacques Lafleur, under the auspices of then Prime Minister Michel Rocard. The deal largely contributed to restoring peace in New Caledonia, after a state of quasi-civil war during the second half of the 1980s. The following year, he and his closest associate, Yeiwéné Yeiwéné, were both shot dead by a man who was identified as Djubelly Wéa, a hard-line member of the pro-independence movement, who believed the signing of the 1988 deal was a "betrayal" of the indigenous Kanak people's struggle for sovereignty and independence. "Nobody has betrayed anybody, whichever party he belongs to. All of us, on both sides, have defended and remained faithful to their beliefs. We had to work and together find a common ground for the years to come, for (New) Caledonians. Now that's what we need to explain", pro-France Rassemblement-LR leader Virginie Ruffenach said. In an interview earlier this week, Valls said he was very much aware of the local tensions. "I'm aware there are risks, even serious ones. And not only political. There are threats on elections, on politicians, on the delegations. What I'm calling for is debate, confrontation of ideas and calm". "I'm aware that there are extremists out there, who may want to provoke a civil war...a tragedy is always possible. "The risk is always there. Since the accord was signed, there have been direct threats on New Caledonian leaders, pro-independence or anti-independence. We're going to act to prevent this. There cannot be death threats on social networks against pro-independence or anti-independence leaders", Valls said. Over the past few days, special protection French Police officers have already been deployed to New Caledonia to take care of politicians who took part in the Bougival talks and wish to be placed under special scrutiny. "They will be more protected than (French cabinet) ministers", French national public broadcaster France Inter reported on Tuesday.
RNZ News
16-07-2025
- Health
- RNZ News
Pacific Waves for 17 July 2025
New Caledonia deal: 'We need time'; Pacific health and police address drugs and HIV crisis; Back to the future for Tonga's Health Data; Deep sea mining continues to draw attention in Tonga. Tags: To embed this content on your own webpage, cut and paste the following: See terms of use.
