Solomons to raise 'interference' with PM

www.smh.com.au
September 1, 2006 - 7:00PM

Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare says he'll raise the issue of alleged Australian interference in his country's judicial system with Prime Minister John Howard.

Sogavare has accused his own attorney-general of acting under Australian influence to pervert the country's judicial system, in which Australians work as part of a regional assistance mission.

He says he will raise the issue of interference with Mr Howard at the Pacific Islands Forum meeting in Fiji in October.

Sogavare says court proceedings challenging terms of reference he set for an inquiry into April's Honiara riots are a "judicial farce" and evidence of foreign influence.

The prime minister is at odds with Attorney-General Primo Afeau, who initiated the High Court challenge to two of Sogavare's terms of reference for the riots inquiry, to be headed by retired Australian judge Marcus Enfield.

Afeau contends the two terms of reference could compromise court cases for two jailed MPs, Charles Dausabea and Nelson Ne'e.

Both men are facing charges of inciting the April 18-19 riots that destroyed most of Honiara's Chinatown.

After Sogavare was elected prime minister in May he earned Australian and New Zealand government rebukes for appointing Dausabea as police minister and Ne'e as tourism minister when they were in jail. He later reversed the appointments.

Sogavare's two contentious terms of reference call for examination of the role any MPs might have had in the riots and a review of whether the arrest, charging and ongoing detention of accused persons was reasonably justified and not politically motivated.

Dausabea was a key figure in winning Sogavare his former prime ministership in 2001.

Australian judges and other judicial officials are working in the Solomons legal system as part of the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands (RAMSI) to restore law and order and good governance after years of ethnic tension.

The High Court on Wednesday heard that judges could be called before the riots inquiry under its present terms of reference.

"This shows how outrageous these terms of reference are," the Solicitor-General, Nathan Moshinsky, acting for the Attorney-General, told the court.

He said two of the 11 terms could lead to serious interference with court work with judges expected to comment on current court cases and he asked Justice John Brown to quash them, the Solomon Star reported.

But Sogavare said the court proceedings were "a clear case of an orchestrated scheme by a judicial system that has succumbed to the dictates of foreign influence and is therefore no longer independent".

He said the court had denied his government of its fundamental right to be represented in the hearing and what transpired was a clear case of collusion to pervert the course of justice.

The fact that the country's judicial system was systematically falling under the control of foreign governments must be a matter of serious concern to all peace-loving Solomon Islanders, Sogavare said.

"Locking Solomon Islanders up on allegations that are based on shaky evidence is akin to pursuing a strategy of legalised slavery and clearly not in the best interest of peace and national unity," he said.

Sogavare said his government would appeal any decision to quash the two terms of reference.

He said he would raise the issue of foreign influence in the judiciary with Mr Howard at the Pacific Islands Form meeting in Fiji in October.

© 2006 AAP