By Lydia & Peter Kailap*

Kaugere is one of the oldest settlements in PNG, having started in the 1960s, and is home to the notorious raskol gang, Koboni. Even other raskol gangs will not tangle with these boys.

These are the boys we live and work with; they are the boys who built our school, teach our children and take care of CUMA – the Chilren’s University of Music and Art, which we established. They have renamed themselves the “Fox Tribe Youth Development Program”.

Mining company Chairman, Ken MacDonald, has gone on the record with some very controversial and potentially misleading claims about the Ramu nickel mine in Papua New Guinea and its plans to dump millions of tons of waste into the sea.

In a radio interview broadcast last Friday in Australia, MacDonald said the waste from the mine will not be toxic. 

This is refuted by mining experts and marine scientists.

ACT NOW! community members were unable to deliver copies of more than 500 protest letters to mining company Highlands Pacific yesterday because the company had closed its office.

 ACT NOW! community members took to the streets in Brisbane today to deliver more than 500 protest letters to the directors of mining company Highlands Pacific.

European countries, which became rich by seizing natural resources from their Colonial empires, are now engaged in a new resources grab using free-trade policies that undermine developing countries and lock them into a cycle of poverty.

This is the conclusion drawn in a compehensive new report on European Union trade policies written by Mark Curtis for a number of European charities and, ironically, funded by the EU.

While the PNG government says in its budget unveiled this week that it wants to 'lower barriers to foreign investment' and remove 'business impediments, lower import tariffs and reducing regulatory burdens' it seems to have forgotten the interests of its own citizens in its rush to support foreign companies.

A new report by the International Trade Union Confederation says there are "serious and continued violations of fundamental workers' rights" in Papua New Guinea.

There has been a lot of talk in the media about the proposed new law to reserve 22 Parliamentary seats for women but very little detail about how the law would work in practice. To try and explain what the law would mean, below are four slides used in the Regional Roadshow that toured the country earlier this year.

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Papua New Guinea is likely to suffer a strong El Nino induced drought from mid-2011 which could last for up to 18 months.

This dire warning comes from the Director-General of the National Agriculture Research Institute, Dr Ragunath Godake, and National Disaster Centre acting director, Martin Mose. 

We must never forget that as ordinary citizens we have a powerful voice and that when we take the time to make our voices heard then change is possible.

By Scott Waide

Tucked away behind the Nobnob mountain on Madang’s North Coast is a small school – the Nobnob primary school. Its students are the liveliest bunch of youngsters I’ve met this year. Keen to learn and well behaved even when the teacher is not there.