CoveragePost
July 27, 2025
INTERVIEW: By Don Wiseman, RNZ Pacific senior journalist One of the first women to hold an open seat in Bougainville, Theonila Roka Matbob, is confident she can win again. Bougainville goes to the polls in the first week of September, and Roka Matbob aims to hold on to her Ioro seat in central Bougainville, where ... <a title="Bougainville woman Cabinet minister battling nine men to hold her seat" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2025/07/27/bougainville-woman-cabinet-minister-battling-nine-men-to-hold-her-seat/" aria-label="Read more about Bougainville woman Cabinet minister battling nine men to hold her seat">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
December 9, 2024
By Stefan Armbruster in Brisbane The first large-scale environmental impact assessment of Rio Tinto’s abandoned Panguna mine in Papua New Guinea has found local communities face life-threatening risks from its legacy. The independent study was initiated after frustrated landowners in PNG’s Autonomous Region of Bougainville took their longstanding grievances against Rio Tinto to the Australian ... <a title="Panguna human rights report fuels Bougainville demands for Rio Tinto-funded mine clean-up" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2024/12/09/panguna-human-rights-report-fuels-bougainville-demands-for-rio-tinto-funded-mine-clean-up/" aria-label="Read more about Panguna human rights report fuels Bougainville demands for Rio Tinto-funded mine clean-up">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
October 13, 2024
By Harry Pearl of BenarNews An initial hearing of a class action against mining giant Rio Tinto over the toxic legacy of the Panguna copper mine on the autonomous island of Bougainville has been held in Papua New Guinea. The lawsuit against Rio Tinto and its subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) is seeking compensation, expected ... <a title="Rio Tinto class action begins over ‘toxic’ Bougainville mine disaster" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2024/10/13/rio-tinto-class-action-begins-over-toxic-bougainville-mine-disaster/" aria-label="Read more about Rio Tinto class action begins over ‘toxic’ Bougainville mine disaster">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
August 2, 2024
INVESTIGATIVE REPORT: By Aubrey Belford of the OCCRP High in the forested mountains of Papua New Guinea’s Bougainville Island lies an abandoned, kilometer-wide crater cut deep into the earth. Formerly one of the world’s largest gold and copper mines, the open pit now serves as an unsightly monument to the environmental and social chaos that ... <a title="Lawsuit promises justice for Rio Tinto’s mining disaster in Bougainville – but some say it’s a cash grab" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2024/08/02/lawsuit-promises-justice-for-rio-tintos-mining-disaster-in-bougainville-but-some-say-its-a-cash-grab/" aria-label="Read more about Lawsuit promises justice for Rio Tinto’s mining disaster in Bougainville – but some say it’s a cash grab">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
June 7, 2023
RNZ Pacific Community leaders around Panguna mine in the autonomous Papua New Guinea region of Bougainville want mining giant Rio Tinto to help out following recent flooding. Rio Tinto was the owner/operator of the mine which has laid derelict for more than 30 years. Fears of the threat from flooding in the river system near ... <a title="Bougainville leaders call on mining giant Rio Tinto to assist communities" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/06/07/bougainville-leaders-call-on-mining-giant-rio-tinto-to-assist-communities/" aria-label="Read more about Bougainville leaders call on mining giant Rio Tinto to assist communities">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
April 4, 2023
Asia Pacific Report Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama today condemned a visiting Papua New Guinean member of Parliament for “mocking” the autonomous region’s independence aspirations during a drunken exchange in Buka last week, saying that he must “atone for his blunder”. A video of Ijivitari MP David Arore allegedly abusing security guards and airport staff while ... <a title="Bougainville president slams ‘mocking’ by drunken MP over independence" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/04/04/bougainville-president-slams-mocking-by-drunken-mp-over-independence/" aria-label="Read more about Bougainville president slams ‘mocking’ by drunken MP over independence">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
July 27, 2022
The National Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama has visited Guava village in the heartland of the Panguna mine in Central Bougainville to pay his respects to the resting place of Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) leader Francis Ona. It was the first time President Toroama had visited Guava in 25 years after the 1997 Roreinang coup that ... <a title="Bougainville’s Toroama visits Ona’s rebel village 25 years after civil war" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/07/27/bougainvilles-toroama-visits-onas-rebel-village-25-years-after-civil-war/" aria-label="Read more about Bougainville’s Toroama visits Ona’s rebel village 25 years after civil war">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
February 20, 2022
Last week the Bougainville Autonomous Government announced an agreement had been reach with Panguna landowners to reopen the island’s controversial gold and copper mine. Once the backbone of the Papua New Guinea economy, Panguna has been idle since the civil war began more than 30 years ago — a war the mine was at least ... <a title="PNG faces dilemma over ‘momentous’ decision to reopen Bougainville’s Panguna mine" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/02/20/png-faces-dilemma-over-momentous-decision-to-reopen-bougainvilles-panguna-mine/" aria-label="Read more about PNG faces dilemma over ‘momentous’ decision to reopen Bougainville’s Panguna mine">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
February 16, 2022
By Gorethy Kenneth in Port Moresby The dormant Bougainville Copper Limited share value has more than doubled overnight on the Australian Stock Exchange following a resolution to reopen the rich but controversial Panguna copper mine. Landowners from the mine area and the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) signed a joint resolution last Friday to reopen the ... <a title="Panguna share value doubles overnight after landowners opt to reopen mine" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/02/16/panguna-share-value-doubles-overnight-after-landowners-opt-to-reopen-mine/" aria-label="Read more about Panguna share value doubles overnight after landowners opt to reopen mine">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
October 8, 2021
By Evan Schuurman Bougainville community leader and MP Theonila Roka Matbob has received the Gwynne Skinner Human Rights Award in recognition of her outstanding work to hold mining giant Rio Tinto to account for the legacy of environmental devastation caused by its former Panguna mine. Matbob, 31, is a traditional landowner from Makosi, just downstream ... <a title="Panguna campaigner Theonila Matbob wins award over Rio Tinto challenge" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2021/10/08/panguna-campaigner-theonila-matbob-wins-award-over-rio-tinto-challenge/" aria-label="Read more about Panguna campaigner Theonila Matbob wins award over Rio Tinto challenge">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
June 9, 2019
By Chris Baria at PNG Mine Watch The chairman of Bougainville Hardliners Group and former combatant-turned-businessman, James Onartoo, has called on the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) Police Minister to explain what the Australian Federal Police (AFP) were doing at the site of the controversial Panguna mine last Wednesday (June 5). According to Onartoo, members of ... <a title="‘Please explain’ call by hardliners over Australian police at Bougainville mine" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2019/06/09/please-explain-call-by-hardliners-over-australian-police-at-bougainville-mine/" aria-label="Read more about ‘Please explain’ call by hardliners over Australian police at Bougainville mine">Read more</a>
CoveragePost
February 23, 2019
Australian mining entrepreneur accused of being “disrespectful” over a demand for wholesale and draconian changes to the mining law. Image: PNG Attitude/PC Pacific Media Centre Newsdesk Landowners throughout Bougainville were today calling on President John Momis for protection from a “callous opportunist.” The landowners said that the customary laws of Bougainville and the basic human ... <a title="Bougainville landowners call on Momis for protection from ‘offensive’ draft law" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2019/02/23/bougainville-landowners-call-on-momis-for-protection-from-offensive-draft-law/" aria-label="Read more about Bougainville landowners call on Momis for protection from ‘offensive’ draft law">Read more</a>
