PNG PM ‘blasts’ bureaucrats

Radio Australia reports that PNG Prime Minister Peter O’Neill has ‘ blasted his public service over the granting of controversial [SABL] leases’.

Handling of TB epidemic criticised

According to the Cairns Post, local doctors are ‘in uproar’ over the handling of a lethal TB epidemic in PNG’s Western Province, after a patient died of the incurable XDR-TB (Extensively Drug Resistant TB) strain at Cairns Base Hospital.

New plant, animal discoveries in Western Province

Scientists believe they have discovered up to 80 new species of plants and animals during a four week survey of the Hindenburg Wall, a 50-kilometre stretch of limestone escarpments near Tabubil in Western Province.

Social media monitoring Fiji

In the week when the Australian Senate condemned the Fiji torture video, Jenny Hayward-Jones of the Lowy Institute’s Melanesia program warned Fiji authorities that ‘The World is Watching’, thanks to smartphones and social media.

China’s oil imports to overtake US

The Washington Post reports that China is ‘appears to be at a tipping point where surging domestic auto sales will soon drive it past the U.S. and turn it into the world’s biggest oil importer’. This is not just down to China’s surging economy, but also the US’s shale oil revolution, which has already made parts of the country self-sufficient.