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Fiji rebels issue new demands in hostage crisis |
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June 4, 2000 SUVA, JUNE 3 (AP) - Backtracking on his plan to release hostages this weekend, coup leader George Speight issued a new list of demands Saturday night that would place Fiji under the control of his gang of rebels.
Speight earlier accused Fiji's new martial law regime of wrecking a plan to end the crisis and lashed out against Fiji's ethnic Indians as "our common enemy."
A military spokesman said the government of Commodore Frank Bainimarama had been consistent in dealing with Speight, and he accused Speight of coming up with fresh demands and prolonging the crisis now in its third week.
Speight released a nine-point proposal that ruled out freedom for the more than 30 hostages, including deposed Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry, until the military transfers its government powers to Fiji's influential tribal chiefs.
Speight includes a further demand that would seem unthinkable to the many Fijians who grant their chiefs enormous respect - telling the Great Council of Chiefs it could not keep its command over Fiji, but instead would have to hand it over to a new president chosen by Speight.
The president, Speight crony Ratu Jope Seniloli, would then choose a government including Speight supporters, and presumably Speight himself.
The latest demands from Speight came just a day after a solution to the standoff seemed near, with both Speight's forces and the military proclaiming breakthroughs in their talks.
Those hopes were shattered early Saturday. Speight accused Bainimarama's regime of reversing itself on a deal to free the hostages this weekend - with the Great Council of Chiefs meeting Monday to decide whether this tiny island nation should have a military or civilian government.
Speight said Bainimarama had opted to cling to power in "a breach of faith."
A military spokesman, Lt. Col. Filipo Tarakinikini, disputed Speight's version of events.
Tarakinikini said military negotiators had always said Bainimarama would stay in charge of Fiji until new, democratic elections can be held - a possibility the military discussed publicly during the week.
Speight "seems to have accused us of reneging on our earlier agreement," Tarakinikini said. "It comes as a surprise to all of us."
For about two days, Speight had focused repeatedly on a meeting Monday by chiefs, who hold no formal power but wield considerable influence here. Speight has said he believed the chiefs would Install him as prime minister.
But the chairman of the Great Council of Chiefs, army Col. Sitiveni Rabuka, suggested Saturday the chiefs weren't even planning to meet on Monday.
"What meeting?" Rabuka asked a Fiji One television news reporter who tracked him down on a golf course.
Rabuka ruled Fiji for 12 years after toppling a democratically elected government in two 1987 coups, and although he is chairman of the chief's council, he is not a tribal chief.
Speight threw Fiji into turmoil on May 19, storming parliament along with six other gunmen and taking the government hostage.
Speight, a failed businessman, wants to prevent the ethnic Indians, who dominate many businesses here, from running Fiji - reserving power for members of the indigenous Fijian majority.
Chaudhry, among those still held in the parliamentary complex, had been the first ethnic Indian to serve as prime minister.
Despite the new round of disagreements, Speight said Saturday he wants to keep negotiating with Bainimarama, also an ethnic Fijian. "We don't want Fijians fighting Fijians - our common enemy is the Indians," Speight told reporters Saturday.
Not all ethnic Fijians agree. About 600 people, many of them ethnic Fijians, turned out at a rally in western Fiji on Saturday to express support for Chaudhry's government and to condemn Speight.
The west is Fiji's economic heart, with most of the sugarcane fields, some small gold mines and the better tourist resorts.
A tribal chief, Ratu Sairusi Naganigavoka, told the crowd that if Speight takes control of Suva, the capital to the east, then western Fiji should break away.
Military roadblocks have cut off supplies to the parliamentary complex where the hostages are held, and Speight's men have been coming out to rob nearby homes, plunder garden crops and kill cattle. There have been frequent skirmishes between Speight supporters and troops.
Many stores and markets in Suva have reopened in the past few days after closing for around two weeks following a riot that broke out when Speight's men seized the government.
But as people flock back to replenish supplies, they find that merchants are short on stock and raising prices. Rich trading partners including the United States, Australia and New Zealand have threatened to impose economic sanctions if Fiji doesn't return to democratic rule.
Fiji is 3,620 kilometers (2,250 miles) northeast of Sydney, Australia.
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