Under subpoena to the Commission of Inquiry into the sinking of the Princess Ashika, I gave a statement under oath to tell the truth including the circumstances of my resignation. The Prime Minister will have that same opportunity.
With due respect to the Commission, as my integrity has been directly called into account, I believe I have a duty to correct those statements, although I am unable by law and ethics to make public all the relevant advice that was given to Government.
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Results for Press Releases
Friday 12 February 2010
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Nuku'alofa, Tonga

Friday 5 February 2010
5 comments
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Nuku'alofa, Tonga
The Prime Minister, Dr. Feleti Vakauta Sevele, revealed, in an interview with Kalafi Moala of TMN Television earlier this week, that the former Attorney General and Minister for Justice, 'Alisi Taumoepeau, was asked to resign because she had deliberately misled Cabinet by concealing the truth, and for challenging His Majestys constitutional authority to appoint an independent Attorney General.

Tuesday 2 February 2010
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Geneva, Switzerland
Almost 400,000 Americans are predicted to die of coronary heart disease in 2010, according to research published today in the international public health journal, the Bulletin of the World Health Organization.

Thursday 28 January 2010
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Bangkok, Thailand
As world economy slowly recovers, developing world faces scarce financing, says World Bank.
Developing countries facing higher borrowing costs, lower credit levels, and reduced international capital flows.

Wednesday 27 January 2010
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Auckland, New Zealand
The father of a 17-year-old boy allegedly assaulted by former All Black Robin Brooke in Fiji on New Year's Eve is suing the rugby star for $200,000, New Zealand media reported.

Thursday 21 January 2010
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Colombia, Sri Lanka
CIAT scientists and their partners in Southeast Asia have issued urgent preliminary guidelines to tackle deadly pest and disease outbreaks that have crippled cassava production in parts of the region.

Sunday 10 January 2010
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Geneva, Switzerland
The United Nations Working Group on the use of mercenaries calls on the United States and the Iraqi Governments to cooperate to ensure that the Nissour Square incident is fully remedied and, in relation to the crimes that may have been committed, those responsible fully held accountable as appropriate.

Wednesday 6 January 2010
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Suva Fiji
The Public Emergency Regulation will be lifted in Fiji as soon as the new Media Decree is implemented.

Friday 1 January 2010
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UK
Certainly we never entertained the idea that democracy can come from the barrel of a gun, as in Iraq, or Afghanistan. Nor can the function of casting and counting votes alone be considered, without a similar weighting for free speech and media freedom, an impartial justice system, and the absence of public corruption, as serious evidence of democracy.

Friday 18 December 2009
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Brussels, Belgium
Fiji has signed on 11 December 2009 an interim Economic Partnership Agreement with the EU. The agreement focuses on trade in goods and provides duty free quota free access for all products from Fiji to the EU market. It also aims to deepen cooperation in areas such as animal and plant health as well as technical standards.

Friday 4 December 2009
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Manila, Philippines
Tonga will get support from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to preserve key social sector spending programs that have come under pressure as a result of the global economic crisis.

Monday 9 November 2009
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Geveva, Switzerland
Despite considerable progress in the past decades, societies continue to fail to meet the health care needs of women at key moments of their lives, particularly in their adolescent years and in older age, a WHO report has found.

Thursday 5 November 2009
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Suva, Fiji
Fijian-born Australian academic Brij Lal has been ordered out of the Pacific nation just hours after speaking to the ABC about the current diplomatic stoush between the two countries.

Tuesday 27 October 2009
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Geneva, Switzerland
Global life expentancy could be increased by nearly five years by addressing five factors affecting health - childhood underweight, unsafe sex, alcohol use, lack of safe water, sanitation and hygience, and high blood pressure, according to a report published by WHO today.

Monday 26 October 2009
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Sydney, Australia
Pacific Island Trade Officials and Ministers will meet their Australian and New Zealand counterparts this week, in Brisbane, to discuss a new trade deal.

Tuesday 20 October 2009
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Rome, Italy
FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf today called on world leaders to reach a "broad consensus on the total and rapid elimination of hunger" when they gather in Rome for the World Summit on Food Security of Heads of State and Government on November 16-18.

Thursday 15 October 2009
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Nuku'alofa, Tonga
Digicel Tonga has donated $5,000 to the Sustainable Coastlines' initiative "Keep Ha‘apai Clean and Beautiful", a huge coastal cleanup taking place at villages on Foa and Lifuka, Ha‘apai today, October 15.

Wednesday 14 October 2009
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Wellington, New Zealand
New Zealand will commit $1.5 million towards tsunami recovery and reconstruction efforts in Tonga, Foreign Minister Murray McCully announced today.

Sunday 11 October 2009
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Cook islands
Greenpeace today called for the arrest of the captain of the Japanese ship Koyu Maru 3, which Greenpeace caught fishing illegally in the Exclusive Economic Zone of the Cook Islands.

Sunday 11 October 2009
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Nuku'alofa, Tonga
Wealthy housewives are loading their shopping trolleys under a cringing weight of organic produce sold twice the price its non-organic version. I am talking here about the wide spectrum now available from beautiful, humble, red tomatoes to exorbitantly expensive organic hemp denim jeans pinned to their shapelu bottoms by a bespoke tailor on her last plastic surgery safari to Johannesburg.
