Solomon Islands

The Commission's Chairman, Francis Luza, says leaders are being reminded to draw the line between official and personal interests.

He says leaders must be guided by law and not allow personal business interests to undermine their official tasks of looking after their public offices, adding they are not above the law.

Mr Luza made the reminder while addressing newly appointed Permanent Secretaries in Honiara.

He says the Leadership Code Commission has an important task of safeguarding leaders who must declare their financial affairs.

Bank of South Pacific (BSP) is working closely with the Central Bank of Solomon Islands (CBSI) to obtain the necessary approvals and discussions with the CBSI have been positive and have well-progressed.

This was revealed in a statement by BSP Group chairman Kostas Constantinou.

He says BSP is confident for a positive conclusion of the new application that is before the CBSI to allow the transaction to proceed shortly thereafter.

Solomon Islands Mission coordinator Pastor Irving Vagha says there are just three Seventh Day Adventists on the far eastern island of Anuta

Recently they built a small church against the wishes of the island's chief, who then demanded they pull it down and has ordered them to leave the predominantly Anglican island.

Pastor Vagha says the president of the church is trying to meet with his Anglican counterpart to find some resolution.

Mr Parapolo says the measure is part of the government's crackdown on illegal logging operations.

He says he is very concerned about the level of allegedly illegal logging but says at the moment there is no way of verifying reports of illegal activity.

Mr Parapolo says the government will work with the Forest Association to track down illegal operators.

The Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) and the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (PIFS) are inviting cultural enterprises in the crafts, visual arts and fashion sectors from Fiji, Samoa and Solomon Islands to apply for funded participation at the popular tradeshow which attracted over 30,000 buyers from over 80 countries this year.

The finalists for the prestigious industry award were unveiled last week at the sixth edition of Seafood Expo Asia in Hong Kong. Dawn Martin, President of SeaWeb, was joined by Suzanne Gendron, Director of the Ocean Park Foundation in Hong Kong and a 2016 Seafood Champion Awards Judge, to make the announcement to a crowd of seafood industry professionals and media.

The Australia-led force was deployed in 2003 after five years of ethnic tensions during which hundreds of people were killed, and thousands forced to flee their homes.

RAMSI has been gradually withdrawing its presence throughout the country as the Royal Solomon Islands Police Force takes control of frontline policing.

The RAMSI force commander, Greg Harrigan, says the police force in Malaita has proven it can maintain law and order without frontline assistance from RAMSI.

A prolonged wet season earlier this year filled the dam to bursting point, prompting the Solomons Government to issue an emergency licence in July for the controlled release of millions of litres of untreated waste water into the river system.

The Chairperson of local landowning company Gold Ridge Community Investment Ltd, Walton Naezon, however says that since then water levels in the dam have dropped.

Mr Naezon says the company is now focusing on building a water treatment plant with the help of mine's previous Australian owners, St Barbara.

The government's special envoy on West Papua Matthew Wale says the Solomon Islands is supporting the United Liberation Movement of West Papua's application for observer status at the Forum.

The ULMWP was granted observer status in the Melanesian Spearhead Group at the regional organisation's recent leaders summit in Honiara.

Mr Wale says Solomon Islands will also urge Forum leaders to support a resolution calling for the UN Human Rights Commissioner to conduct an assessment on the human rights situation in West Papua.

The allegations were originally levelled at logging companies by the former Minister of Forests Bodo Dettke when he was removed from his portfolio amid concerns of it conflicting with his extensive logging interests.

Since then civil society organisations and members of the public have been calling for the offending companies to be prosecuted.

But the president of the Solomon Forest Association, Johnny Sy, says it is almost a month since the allegations were made and no evidence has surfaced to support the claims.