English Literature Practice Questions-Mr Pip

What is the situation in Bougainville? 

The Bougainville conflict, or the Bougainville civil war was a conflict fought from 1988 to 1998 with an estimated 15,000-20,000 Bougainville civilians killed. The leading factor to the start of the civil war was the mining company working on Bougainville called Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) owned by Rio Tinto Limited based in Papua New Guinea (PNG).  

\ Gold was first discovered on Bougainville in 1930 and then copper ore in the 1960s which led to the establishment of the Bougainville Copper Mine. The Panguna mine began production in 1972 with the government of PNG as a 20% shareholder, and at the time it was the largest mine in the world, with it producing more than 45% of Papua new guineas revenue, meaning it was vital to the economy. At first Bougainville’s civilians thought that the mine could give the locals great opportunities for work as well as an economic boost. However, the mine mostly employed people from PNG and Australia. The locals did not like migrants on their land, especially the ‘red-skin’ Papua New Guineans because of the cultural differences between the groups.  

\ This led to many of the local landowners were opposed to the mine, because it attracted workers from other parts of PNG, and as they were about the environmental effects including the company allowing waste from the copper mine leak into the rivers surrounding the mines. Furthermore, the landowners saw most profits leaving the island, meaning there were no benefits to damaging the land. Moreover, because of the excessive mining, locals started to feel their physical, emotional and cultural connection with the land become weaker as more of it was mined up by the Papua New Guinea owned company. 

\ On top of all these reasons they also wanted to gain independence before the mining company can around, which led to tensions rising by the late 1988’s because of the mine. One of the first people to revolt against the mining company was an annoyed landowner called Francis Ona who led sabotage attacks on the mine and by 1989 he, along with other fed-up locals, had forced the mine’s closure and created the party Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA). BRA argued that Bougainville is part of the Solomon Islands and did not profit from the mining that had occurred on the island. Its leader, Francis Ona had quit his job at the mine in 1988 and launch a campaign against the company who owned it, and created a new group, the ‘Bougainville Revolutionary Army.’ he claimed the copper mine had been dug through ancestral lands important to all Bougainvillea’s and that the company had to pay 10 billion kina (£17,975,504,146.08 in today money) in compensation or pay the consequences. However, this demand was seen as extremely unreasonably as Panguna had only made $6.2 billion in revenue in the last 16 years, so they said no which led to a campaign created to sabotage the BCL, and PNG was launched. 

\ First there were a series of arson attacks, explosives stolen from the mine and then the massive power pylons supporting the feeder lines along the mine-access road began to fall. This was done by one of Ona, a young Australian-trained lieutenant from the Papua New Guinea Defence Force, Sam Kauona who joined what members of the Bougainville Revolutionary Part, called the holy war. 

\ Fighting against PNG continued for a year, during which widespread human rights violation occurred from both sides, but mostly in PNG army, including the burning of many villages and the rape and murder of many villagers. In early 1990 PNG withdrew from Bougainville leaving it in control of the BRA. But the fighting did not stop there, with a civil war going on for 11 years after. As, after the war ended BRA leaders proclaimed Bougainville independent from PNG and established the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG). Because of this, fighting between the BRA and PNG defence force escalated with support from Australia. Eventually, in 2001 an accord was struck to stop the civil war in Bougainville and restore peace in the South Pacific.