Pacific Beat

Authorities in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands have declared this week nurses week.

A report into fraud and mismanagement at Papua New Guinea's largest private sector superannuation fund was tabled in the country's parliament yesterday.

There is widespread discontent among church leaders in PNG about an advertisement promoting the use of condoms on national television.

The high death rate of Pacific turtles and seabirds as a result of longline fishing is being examined at the Second International Fishers Forum underway in Honolulu this week.

The Guam-based Black Construction company has begun work on the new US Army Reserve Centre in American Samoa.

New Caledonia's Congress will meet to decide on the size of the next government, which is to be elected on November 28.

The Pacific's peak regional body, the Pacific Islands Forum, claims it will need to increase its budget if it is to implement program approved by Pacific heads of state earlier this year.

Ten regional non-government and community organisations have signed an agreement to co-ordinate programs to strengthen their organisations and campaign activities.

The people of Solomon Islands are being asked for their views on a proposal which would set up a Truth and Reconcilation Commission to deal with the aftermath of four years of ethnic violence.

Vanuatu's controversial police mutiny trial is continuing in Port Vila.

In Solomon Islands, the leader of country's opposition, Patterson Oti, has demanded the resignation of the Prime Minister, Sir Allan Kemakeza.

In American Samoa, a run-off election was scheduled, after each of the candidates failed to claim a simple majority in the November 5th general elections, a requirement under the constitution.

Moves are underway in Fiji to bestow legal power on the country's traditional chiefly representative body - the Great Council of Chiefs.

Church leaders in Kiribati have again urged constituents to vote freely without fear or favour in the coming general elections later this month.

Pacific Island States east of the International Dateline may be in the firing line this cyclone season.

In Guam, Republicans Felix Camacho and Kaleo Moylan defeated the Democrat team of Congressman Robert Underwood and Senator Tom Ada in this year's Congressional elections.

In Fiji, about sixty unionised workers of the popular Fiji Daily Post newspaper are out on strike and are demanding the removal of the Post's General Manager, Yashwant Goundar.

The Australian-based subsidiary of Richard Branson's Virgin Airlines, Virgin Blue, is keen to start flying into the Pacific.

In Vanuatu, eight former senior police officers are facing charges of mutiny, for incitement to mutiny, kidnapping and false imprisonment, relating to a series of arrests they carried out on August 4.