Tagata o te Moana

This week....China exerts its influence at the Pacific Forum...Pasifica attend the Tangihanga of kiingi Tuheitia in numbers....The Pacific is embracing Starlink...cops going bad in Fiji...Winston Peters on the Samoa Citizenship Bill and the Pacific Music awards.

I'm Don Wiseman and today the Pacific Islands Forum summit, the next stage of the Kiribati election process. Deep sea mining drawing closer, there's upset in PNG after a journalist is shut out of a visit by the incoming president of Indonesia., and a call for spiritual leaders to be sent to NZ with RSE workers.

Malo e lelei in Tagata o te moana today - The impasse over New Caledonia, we hear from a new woman MP in Kiribati and what can we expect from the Forum summit in Tonga and Palau claims that China is weaponising tourism.

At the midway point in the Kiribati election newcomers to parliament could hold significant sway. Concerns are being raised on Guam about a build up in US military assets. Winston Peters visits the North Pacific, and later on an all-female Pacific-crewed research vessel arrives in Tonga.

The Kiribati election is drawing close; Fiji's soaring drug issues; The people of Guam are not happy as the US plans its new missile architecture; Google is keen to translate more Pacific languages; RNZ Pacific gets a new shortwave transmitter, and Tahiti's waves rein in Olympic surfers.

More violence in PNG; France says it will talk about New Caledonioa in September; Is mining the ocean floor now very close? A media operator in Solomons unjustly targetted by Facebook; How to save the forests of PNG; Is divorce in Fiji putting kids on the street? What Pacifika abuse victims now expect.

Today, the problems with a lack of land for homes in Papua New Guinea. France ships out armoured cars for the securiity forces in New Caledonia, and questions are raised about invoking custom practice as mitigation in court trials in Samoa.

Ni sa bula vinaka in Tagata O Te Moana this week...Uncertainty continues to hamper efforts to return New Caledonia to normalcy as France heads into its snap election....A significant shift in the Fiji's political landscape is in the offing as time runs out for the FijiFirst opposition party to address constitutional anomalies.....There are concerns in Guam as US military activity on the island ramps up at an unprecented rate...And later on we talk to the director of the theatre adaptation of Tongan comedy Red White and Brass

On Tagata o te Moana this week: Still no clear path forward for New Caledonia a month after crippling unrest in the French Territory; We check in on the situation for New Zealand hostage Phillip Mehrtens in West Papua; New research looks at the cost of service for Pacific communities in Aotearoa; And there is stiff competition in the Micronesian Games underway in Majuro.

The focus in PNG's Enga is on relocating survivors and the surrounding communities; The role of slush funds in the PNG no confidence saga The people of Vanuatu back a constitutional reform its advocates say will end the persistent political instability.