By Norm Dixon
Papua New Guinea Defence Force troops occupying Bougainville have gone on the rampage against the island's civilian population. Several horrific massacres took place in November and December. The Australian government — responsible for funding, arming and training the PNGDF — has remained mute in the face of human rights atrocities that rank amongst the worst in the world at the moment.
Reports reaching the Sydney office of the pro-independence Bougainville Interim Government indicate that at least 22 civilians — including children, women and elderly people — have been killed in several PNGDF massacres beginning November 26.
On November 26, witnesses reported that a group of pro-PNG "Resistance" fighters, together with PNG troops, raided the village of Bogisagu in south Bougainville. Two children were killed while another had two fingers chopped off. The children's grandparents were wounded.
The raiders scrawled a message at the scene which warned: "You too are going to be punished as from now on". That same day, Peter Mutampoko from Detosi village was abducted and executed by PNG forces.
On November 29, nine villagers at the Malapita care centre were killed by a PNGDF mortar which slammed into a church during an early morning service. Five were wounded.
PNGDF troops and Resistance militias swooped on the village of Mokakura, in south-west Bougainville, in the early hours of December 1. At least 11 civilians, and perhaps as many as 16, were massacred, survivors reported.
"Those that died were killed while still asleep on their beds and other were cut [shot] down in front of their houses as they were trying to escape", a distraught witness told the Bougainville Interim Government.
The December 1 attack was part of "Operation Katim Grass", which involved PNGDF attacks on at least five villages in south Bougainville. Dr Herman Oberli, a Swiss surgeon in Honiara Central Hospital in the Solomon Islands, confirmed that fleeing Bougainvilleans have been killed and wounded by internationally banned "dum dum" bullets, which cause horrific injuries.
PNGDF troops on December 1 also invaded the police field post at Ovau in the Solomons Islands' Shortlands province, stealing a radio, an outboard motor and canoe and firearms and ammunition. The Solomons government issued a protest note demanding that PNG "cease forthwith all actions of intimidation and territorial violations of Solomon Islands and its people".
On November 29, a Solomons police post at Tuluve island was twice fired upon from PNGDF speed boats.
BIG President Francis Ona said the PNGDF "are trying to kill as many civilians as possible before they are withdrawn from Bougainville. Those killings and massacres on innocent civilians were totally unprovoked.
"We are extremely concerned that [PNG] Prime Minister Sir Julius Chan has now totally lost control of his military on Bougainville."
Amnesty International on December 6 criticised Port Moresby for its "resounding silence" on the massacre reports. Amnesty accused the PNG government of consistently failing to respond adequately to killings, disappearances and torture by its forces during the eight-year conflict.
If peace is ever to return to Bougainville, Francis Ona said in a statement released on January 9, the PNG military must be withdrawn completely.
This was supported by the BIG's Australian representative, Moses Havini: "The BIG and the BRA will continue to seek genuine peace; but with justice ... Thousands of innocent lives (many more than the acknowledged 10,000) have been lost through guns of the PNGDF (supplied from Australia) and the blockade which prevents medical drugs and services from reaching the people.
"Thousands have been forced ... to live in appalling conditions of the PNG 'care centres' (in effect concentration camps) where in most cases there have been severe shortages of food as well as medicine. There have also been disappearances, atrocities and rapes in these PNG government-controlled centres."
Havini added that the Australian government bears much responsibility for the situation: "The Australian government has funded the entire military operation against my people, and much of the ammunition fired is manufactured in Australia. Australia is in a strong position to withdraw the funds to PNG until there is peace and justice on Bougainville."