9 December 2019

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre’s Amy Sinclair introduces a new portal that focuses attention on a resource-rich area remote from the rest of the world

In recent months, damaging spills caused by foreign miners operating in the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea have wreaked havoc with the safety and livelihoods of coastal communities.

At the same time, with the independence referendum under way in the Bougainville region of Papua New Guinea, mining companies are jostling for new licenses. This is in a region where tensions over the infamous Panguna mine sparked a bloody decade-long civil war in the 1990s. Memories fade fast, particularly when there are profits to be made.

The Pacific region is intensely resource-rich, but with great distances...human rights abuses by companies have too often occurred in the shadows...

The need for this increased visibility is great. Business-related human rights harms in the Pacific are, increasingly, being documented. Yet severe human rights abuses...persist...

...a nascent business and human rights movement is emerging in the Pacific...

To support and chart the growth of this emerging movement, BHRRC has launched a new web portal dedicated to the region. The Pacific portal brings the broad range of local business and human rights issues into sharper focus and amplifies local and community voices...

Efforts like this...are needed to shine a light into the shadows and improve awareness of Pacific business and human rights issues on the global stage.