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First troops head for Solomons
SYDNEY, Australia (CNN) -- The first Australian peace-keeping forces are set to sail for the embattled Solomon Islands with further police and troops expected to join them later this week. The Royal Australian Navy's HMAS Manoora departs the northern Queensland port of Townsville Monday afternoon on a 1,750 kilometer (1,100 miles) journey to the Pacific nation's capital of Honiara. The warship, with about 300 personnel on board, will serve as the headquarters for the Australian-led multinational peacekeeping force tasked with restoring the rule of law to the Solomons. About 2,000 police and troops -- including soldiers from Fiji, Tonga, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Western Samoa -- will be airlifted from Townsville to the Solomons on Thursday. The peacekeepers have been given permission to use "lethal force" if necessary to combat potential attacks from the armed gangs and ethnic militias which have reduced the near-bankrupt Pacific nation to a state of anarchy. The force has been deployed at the request of the Solomon Islands' government. Australian Defense Minister Robert Hill told Australian Broadcasting Corporation radio Monday the force would remain in the Solomons for as long as necessary, but added that he did not believe it would be a lengthy deployment. "It's our commitment to meet the request of the Solomon Islands to help them deal with an issue they can't deal with themselves. And we say the first step in that is a restoration of law and order," Hill said. "And it's really a question of how long that takes. But what I'm saying to you is I don't think that should take too long." The force will concentrate on restoring order in Honiara first before moving on to outlying areas such as the Weather Coast on the island of Guadalcanal and also the region of Malaita if necessary. Further afield
The remote and inaccessible Weather Coast is under the control of warlord Harold Keke who is believed responsible for a string of killings and the burning of numerous villages. The force, Hill says, will also focus on stamping out alleged gun-running operations between the Solomons and the neighboring Papua New Guinea territory of Bougainville, itself a region suffering from a prolonged period of separatist unrest and violence. "We're taking into account the possibility to move further afield," Hill said. "I think the level of success within Honiara will affect the atmosphere across the rest of the Solomon Islands. But we will be capable of moving beyond the capital if that's necessary." The intervention force is the largest military deployment in the South Pacific since World War Two and is believed to have widespread support among the nation's 450,000 people. Hundreds have died in fighting between rival ethnic militias from Guadalcanal and Malaita since 1998 and the country has slowly spiraled towards anarchy and bankruptcy since a police-backed coup in June 2000.
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