PINA

Ministerial-level defence representatives from Japan and 13 Pacific island countries vowed on Thursday in an online meeting to tighten cooperation to maintain maritime order amid China's increasing military activity in the region. The participants in the first such gathering affirmed the importance of promoting a free and open Indo-Pacific, their joint statement said. The concept is an initiative by the...

Samoan Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata'afa has called on the Head of States to have the suspended Attorney-General dismissed entirely from her role, effective immediately as of Thursday 02 of September 2021. In a statement released to the media on Thursday evening, Mata'afa outlined the reasons behind her decision to dismiss Savalenoa Mareva Betham-Annandale who was only appointed to the...

Fiji has recorded 250 new cases of COVID-19 and one death Thursday, increasing the total number of cases in the Pacific nation to 47,186 and 503 deaths since the outbreak in April. Permanent secretary for Health, Dr James Fong said 186 cases are from the Western division, 51 cases are from the Central division in Vitilevu, Fiji's main island and...

Nauru President Lionel Aingimea has praised the University of the South Pacific (USP) for becoming ranked among the world’s top 10 percent of universities by The Times Higher Education rankings (THE). This is the first time that the university has achieved this recognition in its 53-year history. President Aingimea, who is outgoing chancellor and a law graduate and former teacher at...

A Travel Tracer App that will enable contact tracing in the event of the Covid-19 entering and spreading in Samoa, was launched by the Prime Minister Thursday. Samoa’s own Covid-19 contact tracing platform is a joint initiative of the Ministry of Health and the Samoa Tourism Authority. In her remarks, Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mataafa emphasised that the tracing app will...

The Fiji and Samoa sevens teams will be missing when the men's World Sevens Series gets underway in Canada this month. The new season kicks off in Vancouver on September 18, with another tournament in Edmonton the following weekend. But Fiji's Olympic gold medal winning team and Pacific neighbours Samoa have joined New Zealand, Australia and Argentina in opting to skip...

The Fijian Drua will be based in Australia in the next 2022 Super Rugby season. The team will march into quarantine in Australia in the middle of October and plan to start base camp in early November. This has been confirmed by Fiji Rugby Union Chair, Fijian Drua to be based in Australia In a press conference this morning, Begg says they...

Federated States of Micronesia(FSM) President David Panuelo said Wednesday he’ll continue to walk around his island nation without fear, despite an alleged death threat against him over his government’s vaccine mandate. A month ago, Micronesia became one of the few countries in the world to impose a broad rule requiring that all eligible citizens get vaccinated against the coronavirus. Soon after,...

Despite border closures and reduced air and sea travel because of COVID-19, Customs administrations in the region say threats in the Pacific remain high from illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing fleets – as well as threats from illegal movements of people, drugs and weapons, which are often facilitated by trusted insiders. The issue was discussed at the Oceania Heads of...

The 16th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention for the Protection of Natural Resources and Environment in the South Pacific Region, also known as the Noumea Convention, officially convened today, with Parties and Observers joining virtually due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemics and subsequent border closures across the Pacific. The Noumea Convention, which entered into force...