Fiji

Fiji deported Fiji Times publisher Rex Gardner on January 27, five days after he and the newspaper were fined 100,000 Fiji dollars (40,000 euros) for publishing a reader’s letter criticising a court decision. Gardner is the third newspaper publisher with Australian nationality to be expelled by Fiji’s military-backed government in the past year. His predecessor at the Fiji Times, Evan Hannah, was...

The editor of Fiji's oldest newspaper has been ordered to jail and the publication has been fined F$100,000 (NZ$104,000) for printing a letter critical of the military regime and the court system, Fairfax Media has reported. Fiji Times editor-in-chief Netani Rika has been convicted of contempt and jailed for three months with a suspended sentence for two years on a good behaviour bond. The ruling...

Tensions between New Zealand and Fiji have heightened further after the latter deported ONE News Pacific Correspondent Barbara Dreaver and threatened to expel New Zealand's top diplomat there in the developing row over travel sanctions. Dreaver landed in Auckland Tuesday afternoon after being detained at Fiji's Nadi Airport Monday night. Dreaver had flown in Monday night to cover the escalating...

Fiji's interim government has asked the court to jail the publishers and editors of two of the country's daily newspapers for six months each and impose a fine of $1 million (approx. US$539,000) over their publication of a letter that criticised the High Court's validation of the 2006 military coup. The Fiji Times and Daily Post newspapers have published statements acknowledging their guilt on...

Fiji's military government has recommended to the High Court sentence to the editor and publisher of Fiji Times to jail. Last week, the newspaper printed a front page apology and admitted that it was in contempt, for publishing a letter critical of the High Court Panel, which made a judgment that the 2006 coup was legal. On Monday, Fiji's Solicitor-General told Justice Thomas Hickie that the...

Fiji's military government deported the Australian publisher of Rupert Murdoch's Fiji Times newspaper on Friday, after declaring him a threat to national security, according to Reuters. The move is the latest crackdown on the media in Fiji since military commander Frank Bainimarama seized power in a bloodless coup in late 2006, and comes amid growing international criticism of the slow progress in...

Fiji's military government defied a High Court order and deported the Australian publisher of the South Pacific country's leading newspaper Friday, continuing a campaign of media intimidation it began within days of seizing power, the Associated Press (AP) has reported. The coup-installed government said Fiji Times publisher Evan Hannah was a threat to national security who breached his work...