Papua New Guinean Independence
Australia administered Papua as a territory and New Guinea under a UN trusteeship, and moved towards independence in the 1970s under international pressure and a Whitlam government keen to divest. Michael Somare's Pangu Pati led the transition. The state inherited extraordinary linguistic and social fragmentation, an economy where the Bougainville copper mine supplied a large share of export earnings and government revenue, and a colonial administration that had reached parts of the highlands only in living memory. Bougainville, geographically and ethnically closer to the Solomon Islands than to the mainland, declared its own independence days before the national ceremony and was brought back in with a promise of provincial autonomy. Grievance over the mine's environmental destruction and the distribution of its revenue produced an armed rising in 1988; the mine closed, the ensuing conflict and blockade killed thousands, and the 2001 peace agreement provided for a referendum, held in 2019, in which 98 percent voted for independence. Negotiations over implementation continue.
- Year: 1975 CE
- Category: Political
