From mosa@netcom.com Tue Sep 5 23:33:36 1995 From: mosa@netcom.com (Michele Lord) To: dave@sgi.sgi.com From: EUGENE@zodiac.rutgers.edu Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive Subject: Victims of French Nuclear Tests Seek Independence Followup-To: alt.activism.d Date: 5 Sep 1995 17:02:31 GMT Lines: 97 Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu NNTP-Posting-Host: pencil.cs.missouri.edu Resent-From: rich Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu from An Phoblacht/Republican News news and views of the Irish Republican movement--Sinn Fein August 24, 1995 Victims of French nuclear tests seek independence Mutiny in the land of Bounty WHEN the French government announced their decision to resume nuclear weapons testing, it was surprising casualties didn't result from the subsequent rush to condemn them. As governments worldwide battled each other for occupancy of the moral high ground, their solemn pronouncements were displayed prominently in the mainstream media. Their perspective was clear - by their actions the French were jeopardising the cosy arrangement whereby the big powers of the First World held onto their huge nuclear arsenals. This was, and is, a tactical dispute between the members of the world's nuclear club. Forgotten and ignored amidst the clamour is the fact that the French intend conducting these tests in a part of the world that is not rightfully theirs. And they will be doing so with flagrant disregard for the wishes of that region's inhabitants. The French nuclear tests are scheduled to be held on the Mururoa Atoll, in the South Pacific. The Atoll is just one component of a region inaccurately known as 'French Polynesia', located in the south Pacific. First colonised by the French in the 1840s, Polynesians have in recent years expressed their growing desire for independence through support for Tavini Huiraatira - the Polynesian Liberation Front. LEADER INTERVIEWED The current head of Tavini is Oscar Temaru, recently elected mayor of a town close to the Tahitian capital of Papeete. Formed in 1975, Tavini Huiraatira has argued consistently for complete independence for Polynesia, a redistribution of the region's wealth and an end to French nuclear testing. According to Temaru, in an interview with Australia's Green Left Weekly, the French nuclear programme in Polynesia has been instrumental in transforming the region into one which is heavily dependent on the colonial power. The large infusion of capital which accompanied the inception of the programme in 1966 resulted in population flight, as Polynesians flocked to Tahiti in search of supposedly lucrative work. Within a decade Tahiti had lost the economic self -sufficiency it enjoyed for years. Today, its dependency is such that it must import over 80% of the food it eats, while unemployment runs at an alarmingly high rate of one in four. Control of Polynesia, says Temaru, is perpetuated through the educational system, which is wholly French in composition. Thus, he says, there is a dearth of native doctors, lawyers and technicians. ''All these occupations are controlled by the French. That means we are completely dependent on what the French would like to do in our country.'' Since 1981, Temaru says, his party has urged people to ignore and boycott French elections. Ten years ago, the level of abstention stood at a healthy 30%. Today, it is an even more impressive 70%. SILENCE This, he says, bodes well for the movement's aim of achieving total independence by the year 2000. Ironically, given their relative silence on the issue, he cites the fact that the UN has marked this decade as the one in which colonialism is to be eradicated worldwide. The French decision on nuclear testing is, he says ''a good example of the colonial system''. Temaru also criticised the nearby governments of New Zealand and Australia for their failure to support independence movements in the Pacific region. In particular, he points to the hypocrisy of the Australian government who, while loudly denouncing the French decision to resume testing, have aided their programme by continuing to sell them uranium. Double Standard of the Week Award goes to Australia's PM, Paul Keating. --------------- posted in,,, IRL-NEWS to subcribe, send message: send message to: From mosa@netcom.com Fri Sep 22 17:09:08 1995 From: mosa@netcom.com (Michele Lord) To: dave@sgi From: EUGENE@zodiac.rutgers.edu Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive Subject: French tests spur independence movement Followup-To: alt.activism.d Date: 21 Sep 1995 04:15:34 GMT Organization: ? Lines: 94 Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu NNTP-Posting-Host: pencil.math.missouri.edu Resent-From: rich Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu from An Phoblacht/Republican News news and views of Sinn Fein, the Irish Republican movement Spet. 15, 1995 French tests galvanise freedom movement WHEN THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT finally sits down to count the cost of their decision to resume nuclear testing in the South Pacific, it is unlikely lost exports of wine will top the list. That position, it seems increasingly likely, will be reserved for Polynesia. With remarkable aplomb, a bumbling Jacques Chirac has managed to forge an unprecedented degree of unity amongst the people of so-called 'French Polynesia', ensuring an irrevocable gap has opened up between the colonial power and its colony of 150 years. That common sense of purpose was seen in the riots which followed the first French test. They were provoked by attacks on peaceful demonstrators, by colonial police using batons and tear gas. In their aftermath, one Tahitian remarked to reporters of a new-found sense of ''harmony'' in Tahitian society. Another pointed out that the colonial power was simply reaping what it had sowed: ''The French have treated us as rubbish, as rats, and now you see what happens.'' France transferred its nuclear weapons programme to Tahiti in 1965, after the occupants of the previous test site - the Algerian people - sent the colonial power packing. The introduction of the expensive weapons programme, into a largely rural and self-sufficient region, was promoted as the gateway to progress: with it would come jobs, money and an overnight leap into the First World. That clearly has not happened. In a recent profile of the Polynesian independence movement in AP/RN, its leader Oscar Temaru explained how the test programme has served merely to increase the region's dependence on France. Thus, the weapons programme encouraged Polynesians to abandon outlying islands in favour of supposedly lucrative work on Tahiti. By 1975, the region had lost its economic self-sufficiency and today, it must import over 80% of the food it eats. Unemployment runs at a rate of one-in-four. The decision to resume testing was simply the straw that broke the camel's back. DANGEROUS MYTH But one disappointing aspect of the whole affair is the manner in which environmental organisations have studiously avoided identifying with the cause of Polynesian independence. Their concentration on exclusively environmental concerns carries the clear implication that this issue can be divorced from the everyday, political world - that environmental destruction is somehow unrelated to existing global power structures. That is a dangerous myth. The same global-power system which today threatens the South Pacific, yesterday threatened to consume the world in a nuclear conflict. The same global-power structure which threatens the existence of the ozone layer, also threatens the continued existence of the world's rainforests. The examples are legion. Environmental destruction is not borne out of a hatred of nature, but results from a political system which has, at its core, a determination to preserve economic privilege. Tavini Huiraatira - the independence party of which Oscar Temaru is head - see the issues of independence, a redistribution of wealth and an end to nuclear testing as inextricably linked. As one Tahitian, a union organiser, said last week: ''We question the West's notion of progress. We see half the world starving, the rich getting richer and environmental destruction worsening. There are still places where life is not based on money, but on nature. Perhaps we should look there.'' The Polynesian experience ought to go down as a standard example of how to think globally and act locally. -------------- posted in.... 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