HONIARA (SIBC/PINA) — A Solomon Islands government special envoy has returned from the Weather Coast of Guadalcanal after being sent to investigate rumors of killings in the area.
SIBC learned that West Honiara MP Yukio Sato met with Prime Minister Allan Kemakeza upon returning to Honiara. A former Malaita Eagle Force militant group is understood to have met with the prime minister after this.
SIBC was not able to get Kemakeza to comment, but reports reaching SIBC say some men who went on the unknown mission to the Weather Coast were killed in an incident there.
Sato had been negotiating with Guadalcanal militia leader Harold Keke, who has not signed the peace agreement ending more than two years of bloody ethnic conflict between Guadalcanal and Malaitan militias. This began over land disputes.
Keke’s stronghold is the rugged and little developed Weather Coast.
Meanwhile, Member of Parliament for East Kwaio Alfred Sasako expressed grave concern over an article on the People First Network Web site and e-mail service titled “Conflicting Reports on Weathercoast Incident.”
Sasako has demanded that the People First Network publish an apology and the appropriate section be withdrawn from the Web site.
People First Network has since published an apology for posting what it called material from unconfirmed, uncontrolled and unreliable sources.
