The Marmot’s Hole

Senior Constable Alex Orovea patrols the Highland Highway, considered the economic lifeline of Papua New Guinea, near Kundiawa in Simbu Province. Australia will begin its long-awaited intervention this weekend to help restore law and order to this deeply troubled South Pacific nation of 770 distinct tribes.(AFP/file/Torsten Blackwood)

Seems like Australia’s going to be helping yet another one of its neighbors from going in the tank:

SYDNEY (AFP) - A first contingent of uniformed Australian police heads to Papua New Guinea this weekend to launch a risky law-and-order mission in the troubled Pacific nation, officials said.

Justice Minister Chris Ellison and the head of the Australian Federal Police, Mick Keelty, held a ceremony in Canberra Friday to farewell the first 18 of 210 police officers who will be deployed to PNG under the initiative.

The 18 will fly to the capital, Port Moresby, on Sunday, Ellison said.

“Today’s ceremony marks another vital step in Australia’s efforts to help our neighbors improve law and order and build accountable and sustainable law enforcement,” he said.

Under the five-year, 800-million-dollar (560 million US) “Enhanced Cooperation Program”, Australia will also send 64 senior civil servants to PNG with powers to root out corruption and tighten the country’s finances.

The plan is part of a more aggressive Australian policy aimed at helping faltering states in the Pacific before they become havens for organised crime or international terrorists.

Last year Australian forces spearheaded a 2,000-strong military intervention in the neighboring Solomons, where four years of ethnic strife had left the government on the brink of collapse.

Interesting is where the boys will be deployed:

The first group of Australian policemen will be deployed to Port Moresby and Bougainville, an island province that remains troubled three years after a peace deal formally ended a bloody 10-year war separatist war.

The rest of the 210-member contingent will deploy from September to March, primarily in Port Moresby but also along the dangerous Highlands Highway which serves as an economic lifeline between the resource rich mountains of central PNG and the port city of Lae.

Bougainville, of course, was a favorite of Robert Pelton, who did a special on it for ABC News way back when and dedicated a whole section to the place over at Dangerous Places. I have always found this little piece of history intriguing:

Papua New Guinea has had a dirty little bush war (as they are called in the trade) festering on the island on Bougainville. A large copper mine owned by Rio Tinto now called (RTZ-CRA) provided 45 percent of PNG’s income, and now it was in the hand of a rag tag group of rebels who had the gall to just shut it down. The PNG Defense Force has been trained by the Aussies and the U.S. Special Forces since 1975. Enter Colonel (retired) Tim Spicer, the CEO of Sandlines, a U.K. based security, and Executive Outcomes (run by Chairman Nick van der Berg). Now it seems that EO had invented the equivalent of a Visa card for cash-strapped Third World countries that had rebel problems. He would take your collateral and get a piece of the mining action (or be paid by the mining company direct) in exchange for training and liberation services. In PNG’s case about $46 million worth. Now, PNG would have been placed in a dire predicament if the rebels had captured a university or public broadcasting radio station, but luckily they grabbed a gold and copper mine instead that could be put back into business in a jiffy.

Well, this didn’t sit well with the PNG military commander who was having a hard time getting bullets and uniforms for his men, let alone fair haired mercenaries complete with Russian gunships. He was a little riled that all this newly found dough was being spent on military tourists and proceeded to lock up the EO mercs and even invited fair haired Colonel Tim to stay behind to answer a few questions. Hell, EO was even going to fly their wounded to Brisbane, Australia, for medical care while the PNG ground pounders had to make do with local quacks. To make a long story short somebody cashed the 50 percent deposit, all the killer boys went back to SA and the rebels on Bougainville had a whoop up to celebrate the easiest victory they ever won. It seems the government figured it might be cheaper to sign a peace deal instead of killing all the islanders with high priced mercenaries.

Can’t make this stuff up.