ID # U85

Title: The Internet and the Fiji and Solomon Islands Coup
Franck Martin
SOPAC
Fiji

The year 2000 was eventful in the Pacific. We saw a country going into civil war (Solomon Islands) and another country having a coup (Fiji Islands). This paper is not to present the reasons behind these events but to explain the role the Internet has played in both events, and unfortunately in other events to come. I will summarise shortly for the people unaware of the political situation in the Pacific. This is just a summary and cannot be taken for the reality, which is more complex.

The Solomon Island insurrection came from the fact that the American had relocated the old capital from Malaita to Guadalcanal for reasons of war during WWII. These islands are close to each other and equal in size. However this led to a migration of Malaitans to Guadalcanal to be part of the government. Due to the economic crisis the racial sentiment became stronger and the two factions started to affront each others in Honiara and its neighbourhood.

In Fiji, in May 1999, after a new constitution and fresh new election, the powers shifted in the government to a labour led coalition. This coalition appointed a Prime Minister of Indian descent. One Year later a group of armed men took over the parliament. The government and parliamentarians were held in hostage for 56 days.

I can describe the event in Fiji with more details as it was well covered. On May 19 an armed group took over a session of parliament, while a manifestation in town degenerated in looting. At the same time, in a situation similar to the 1987 coup the telecommunication link was tentatively controlled to avoid that the news filter outside the country. In this case the telecommunication link between Telecom Fiji Ltd, the national carrier, and FINTEL the sole International telecommunication carrier was sabotaged. However it was a little bit late, already phone calls and e-mails had been made to report the take over of the parliament. This link fortunately was not the only communication link to the outside world but nearly. The only other means of communication were systems, which were allowed by the government despite its strict enforcement of the monopoly of the telecommunication industry. These other links were:

• Inmarsat C system (Embassies and yachties in Fiji),
• Peacesat, a satellite communication system for developing countries run by the University of Hawaii,
• USPNet, a satellite network linking the University of the South Pacific and its campus in Pacific Island Countries,
• COMET, a satellite link between the sites of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community in Suva and Noumea.

This is important to realise here, the importance to have redundant links of communication to avoid a total blackout. Fiji, as well as Solomon Islands, are subject of cyclone which could damage the only satellite dish which provides international communication link.

Fortunately to Fiji, FINTEL was commissioning its Southern Cross Cable, a fibre optic cable that links Fiji, to New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii and California. All the engineers present, commissioning the cable, were able to restore in less than an hour the link between Telecom Fiji and FINTEL. However the amount of calls exchanged with overseas put directly the system in overload. It was impossible to place to or receive a call from overseas. The only communication link that took the load was Internet via e-mail and instant messaging like ICQ. It was possible to alert families and other organisations of the situation or to cancel any travel to Fiji.

The overload lasted for about three days…

In normal time the Internet in Fiji is quite loaded but in this particular case it demonstrated its capacity to take extra load without failing.

However as is the Internet all information disappeared as soon as it was created and no archives exists of this period.

In Solomon Island, where the situation is not as evolved the information was mainly exported via e-mail, and known list of contacts were used to get reliable information on the development in the country.

Both FijiLive and FijiVillage provided free web based Forums. The majority of the posting on these forums where flame wars between the 2 races living in Fiji: the indigenous Fijian, and the people from Indian decent. However there were requests for information and contact between people. On another situation on FijiLive a person called himself Jack appeared and started to post information which was very accurate. The question resulted was: was Jack part of the coup or was he someone living near the parliament? Most of his posting contained some military intelligence, or at least were looking like. Through Jack or others there was a real work of propaganda or counter propaganda. Later on, during the failed mutiny at the Queens Elisabeth Barracks, Jack appeared again with some very precise information. Much later Jack came back but it seemed that his posting were coming from California. People are still enquiring about who is Jack. May be the Echelon base located in New Zealand knows?

Here again the Internet was proving to be a tool for propaganda and misinformation or information, which could be used to bring chaos to sustain the coup leaders still in parliament and trying to take over by instigating fear in the population to disorganise the police and military services.

The then government put pressure to the web site to remove the flame war and the anonymity of the postings. An IP logging system was installed and much later it was required to register a login with the web site. This last system was quickly abandoned due to complain from users who were using the service as an alternative source of news.

As before, no archives were kept, and it is a pity as the postings could have been a subject for a thesis.

In another domain, the deposed government started its first web site to inform the public about their views of the situation. As much of the news were coming from the interim government, the deposed government wanted to show the other side of the coin of the situation in Fiji. This is interesting to see that the coup made realise the power of the Internet to a government, which seemed to ignore Internet development in the country.

During the events, a number of countries removed their students from the University of the South Pacific. To ensure the continuation of the courses, USPNet was actively used and lectures were mainly broadcasted towards Samoa, Tonga and Solomon Islands. When the student came back in Fiji, much of the semester was not lost.

In this new age of instant communication, and Internet it is true that conflicts are fought on the digital border too. Proponents have realised that their versions of the truth will reach a wider audience via Internet. It is especially true when most of the development aid and support is coming from foreign countries and overseas public. So it is important to be able to communicate to these targets.

In summary the Internet is a vital tool in conflicts, to inform the public, to preserve the services and rebuild countries.