Rosemarie Gillespie, campaigner for human rights in Bougainville, was arrested by NSW police as she travelled through Tarcutta en route to Canberra from Melbourne on May 27. Police have laid charges relating to her possession of urgently needed life-saving medical preparations bound for Bougainville. The medicines have been confiscated by police.
The medicines involved are antibiotics and anti-malarial drugs donated by Melbourne's Alfred and Royal Children's Hospitals to the Australian Humanitarian Aid for Bougainville organisation.
Bougainville has been blockaded by the Papua New Guinea government for over three years. More than 2000 children have died in that period because vital medical supplies have not been available. Gillespie and her colleagues in the Australia Humanitarian Aid for Bougainville have angered the PNG government by breaching the blockade and delivering essential drugs.
Gillespie was detained for several hours at the Wagga Wagga police station before being released on bail late at night. As a condition of her bail, the police required her to surrender her passport. This will prevent Gillespie from accompanying Bougainville's delegation to the UN Human Rights Conference in Vienna.
The Australian Democrats law and justice spokesperson, Senator Sid Spindler, on May 28 called on the NSW director of public prosecutions to drop the charges against Gillespie. Her arrest and the seizure of the medicines were an "unwarranted harassment", Spindler said.
"The net result of the selective and obviously premeditated targeting in this case is a delay in the delivery of these medicines to the people of Bougainville, increasing their plight and possibly causing loss of life."
Gillespie's arrest raises many questions that need to be answered. Was she under surveillance by state and
federal secret police while in Melbourne? Given the Australian government's military backing of PNG and the blockade of Bougainville through supply of weapons, ammunition, training and the supply of helicopters and patrol boats, were the federal government and its agencies involved in Gillespie's arrest and the sabotage of her humanitarian project?