Calls for investigation after homes burn in PNG

Transcript

Amnesty International is calling for an investigation into the alleged burning of up to 200 homes in the Papua New Guinea gold mining town of Porgera.

Community leaders say the houses were razed to the ground during a police raid on Friday on Wingima village, which borders the Canadian-owned Porgera mine.

Amelia Langford reports.

The area has been under a state of emergency for the past month, with extra security forces deployed over concerns of illegal mining. A landowner in Porgera says the Canadian miner, Barrick Gold, which runs Porgera Mine, is acting as a law unto itself. A spokesperson for the Porgera Landowners Association, Jethro Tulin, says he believes Barrick ordered the raid to shift landowners, instead of agreeing to resettle people and provide compensation.

JETHRO TULIN: Barrick is acting like the state and it's getting out of control at the moment. We are basically saying Barrick must become a party to the Porgera agreement. If it does not want to become a party then they must get out of the country or get out of the place if they don't want to listen and act like good corporate citizens.

The MP for Porgera, Nixon Mangape, says the raid was clearly an attempt to stop illegal mining. Here is a spokesperson for the MP, Yalo Hexton Kapi.

YALO HEXTON KAPI: What they are doing now is adding fuel to the tension that is among the landowners, and at the same time to the illegal miners. So, burning down of the houses, taking of innocent people in Porgera, like using guns and doing all these things. You know, they're human beings so they will retaliate.

Yalo Hexton Kapi says the landowners must be compensated and resettled if the situation is to be resolved. Meanwhile, the human rights group Amnesty International is calling for an investigation. Its Pacific researcher, Kate Schuetze, says in 2009 there were similar attacks. She says forced evictions are never an appropriate response to law and order issues.

KATE SCHUETZE: These are very serious human rights violations. It leaves particularly women and children open to abuses and we know that the site of the mine has also been an area where there have been claims of sexual abuse and rape so it is really alarming that this is still going on.

Kate Schuetze says those involved must be prosecuted.

KATE SCHUETZE: What we want in this situation is for the police, the authorities, everyone around that area to take a step back and look into this issue and investigate the issue and make sure that those people responsible are held accountable.

Amnesty International is also calling for PNG authorities to provide emergency assistance to those people who have lost their homes. In a statement, Barrick Gold's subsidiary Porgera Joint Venture confimed it is aware of the situation.

PORGERA JOINT VENTURE: The Porgera Joint Venture confirms that it has received reports that a number of structures at Wingima village near the Porgera mine have been removed by police personnel deployed to the Porgera Valley under a special deployment to address declining law and order across the Porgera District...PJV personnel were not in any way involved in the operations of the special police deployment.

The Porgera Joint Venture says it did not specifically request the special police deployment although they and other senior community figures have raised their concerns about growing lawlessness in the area. Mining Watch Canada has said people have been asking to be fully resettled for years and it is time the Canadian miner complied rather than moving people on a so-called need to move basis. The Papua New Guinea police could not be reached for comment but earlier told media that 20 homes were burnt down rather than 200.

This is Amelia Langford.