N.Z. against Kanak move—Mr Lange
From PATRICIA HERBERT in Rarotonga The Prime Minister, Mr Lange, indicated yesterday that New Zealand would oppose Kanak moves to have New Caledonia put back on the United Nations decolonisation list. After arrival at Rarotonga for the South Pacific Forum, Mr Lange suggested that reinscription might backfire on the Kanaks. He said that the French Government was now entrenched in the movement towards independence and asked why frustrate it, why have the side issue, why not get on with the job? While his inclination was to oppose the Kanak application, he would listen to their arguments. The forum, which will run for two days, will begin on
Wednesday morning (New Zealand time); already it is plain that New Caledonia will be a hot issue. The Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (F.L.N.K.S.) has backed the call for reinscription with a communique to the forum demanding that it condemn French colonialism in New Caledonia. The statement, delivered under the name of F.L.N.K.S.’ leader, Mr Yann Celene Uregei, referred to the “warlike” mobilisation of French military forces agains Kanaks at Thio last week.
Mr Uregei denounced the hypocrisy of the French Government, saying that while it asserted a willingness to appease, it was intensifying its acts of repression. The forum has been asked
also to weigh in against France on behalf of the French Polynesian independence movement. Groups representing the Maohi people have presented a joint submission asking the forum to support their call to have French Polynesia reinscribed on the United Nations list as a means of hastening the move towards self-govern-ment. They have asked also that a definite term be put on the existence of French colonialism in the Pacific, asserting that the nuclear testing programme at Mururoa presents a threat to regional security and to the environment. They want an application for observer status from President Gaston Flosse’s colonial government to be rejected.
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Press, 5 August 1985, Page 5
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318N.Z. against Kanak move—Mr Lange Press, 5 August 1985, Page 5
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