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Election uncertainty is featuring in news across the Pacific, while several countries in the region are wrestling with environmental security challenges. Tensions have continued in Solomon Islands, with a moratorium announced on foreign navy vessels, following controversy around an American coast guard vessel which was denied entry to Honiara for a scheduled port call three…

Speaking up to end plastic pollution Ensuring Pacific voices are heard Important negotiations are ongoing to establish a global plastic waste treaty, but Pacific voices need support to ensure they’re heard, Trisia Farrelly writes. There is consensus amongst Pacific Island countries and territories (PICTs) on the need for an effective and comprehensive binding plastic pollution…

In West Papua, HIV and social inequality go hand in hand, and COVID-19 has made things even worse, Jenny Munro, Els Rieke Tieneke Katmo, and Yustina Wambrauw write. HIV is rife in West Papua. The Indonesian province is reported to have the highest levels of infection outside of West Africa, with Indigenous peoples particularly affected. Rampant social…

It’s time for Pacific law enforcement agencies to work together, rather than trying to combat the region’s growing drug crisis in isolation, Kuliniasi Ligaitamana Tukutukuwaqa writes. Law enforcement agencies in the Pacific can no longer afford to work in isolation. Transnational organised criminal syndicates have long used the Pacific in the past as a transit point for…

The security stories shaping the region Democracy is in the news as James Marape has secured another term as Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea after a controversial election, whilst Manasseh Sogavare of Solomon Islands has attempted to defer his country’s election one full year. James Marape was elected unopposed as Prime Minister of Papua…