THE PACIFIC: Cook Islands

William Woo writes: " Thanks for passing along the notes and comments about the Cook Islands. Actually, I'm going there because my wife has some work to do of a volunteer nature, and our youngest boy Peter and I are more or less tagging along. I say less, because there are some free press issues in the Cook Islands I want to look into. Here are a couple of recent items that I've taken off the Web:

"Journalists banned from media conference. The president of the Cook Islands Media Association has been banned from attending a conference designed to examine issues of freedom of expression and news reporting. President Florence Syme-Buchanan, is amazed at the decision to exclude her and her members from discussing the very issues which concern them most. - May 4"

"Minister backs off newspaper licensing. Deputy Prime Minister Norman George says the Government has no plans to license newspapers. The previous week he told Parliament it was now time to look at a licensing process, mainly to bring into line the Cook Islands News. This week he said it was an off-the-cuff remark. However, he continued to attack the paper for publishing anonymous letters which criticised and named individuals. The paper's editor said the source of all letters were checked but the policy of publishing anonymously was to protect the writers from victimisation, specially in view of Rarotonga's small population (7000). The paper has been a thorn in Mr George's side ever since the Coalition Government came to power. - May 2"

Ronald Hilton - 6/18/01