PINA

Agreement by countries to launch a process to develop a new global accord on pandemic prevention and response is cause for hope, the head of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Wednesday in Geneva. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus welcomed the consensus decision, reached during a special session of the World Health Assembly (WHA), the UN agency’s top decision-making body, attended...

Fiji currently have COVID-positive travellers in quarantine who arrived in the country from African states before we knew about Omicron. Permanent Secretary for Health and Medical Services, Dr James Fong clarified this in his COVID-19 statement last night. Dr Fong said these travellers have been quarantined in line with the stringent measures we apply to countries we consider a red zone...

Samoa Electoral Commissioner, Faimalomatumua Mathew Lemisio, tendered his resignation on Wednesday with immediate effect to become the new Land and Titles Court Deputy President, a role coming under scrutiny for never having been advertised. Faimalo’s exit comes two days after national by-elections when he was part of the process of issuing warrants of elections for six constituencies and meeting a...

Amid the ongoing uncertainty of the COVID pandemic, New Zealand Rugby has revealed to Newshub definitively that the inaugural season of Super Rugby Pacific will go ahead. But what that looks like remains unclear with the MIQ border changes announced by the government last week presenting major doubts over whether the competition will go ahead, with quarantine measures required for...

Fiji Rugby has pledged to continue to invest in its local players and development pathway players. Following the announcement by World Rugby to approve the eligibility change rule to allow players to switch nationality. Chief Executive, John O’Connor, says this is good news as there will be some overseas-based players however, the discussion will have to come from the players themselves...

Fiji has thrown open its doors today to tourists for the first time in 20 months, despite fears over the new Omicron coronavirus variant. The first Australian tourists touch down in the Pacific Island nation this morning from Sydney and daily flights from Melbourne will also begin today. All tourists must be fully vaccinated and show a negative PCR test taken...

The Marshall Islands is one of only a handful of nations never to have experienced a single case of community transmission of Covid-19. Its border closure in the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020 and later implementation of one of the world’s strictest quarantine programmes for people coming into this isolated island group have kept it Covid-free. Twenty-one...

Pacific kava farmers and producers will now have direct access to the Australian market under Phase Two of the Morrison Government's Kava Pilot, recognising the significant cultural and economic importance kava has for Pacific communities. From 01 December, producers will be able to apply to import kava for commercial purposes under the two-year pilot. The quantity of kava that can...

By Shailendra B. Singh, Folker Hanusch While global scholarship on the professional views of journalists has expanded tremendously in recent decades, the Pacific remains a blind spot, with sporadic research at best. For instance, the Pacific was not featured in the Worlds of Journalism study on 76 countries, perhaps the most ambitious undertaking in the field as yet. The lack of...

Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare has announced that New Zealand officers will now join three other countries: Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Australia in the latest intervention to support Solomon Islands following last week’s unrest in Honiara. In his address last night, Sogavare said: “We have opened our borders to allow our neighbours to enter to assist us. New...