MARK DODD AND BRENDAN NICHOLSON
FOREIGN Minister Bob Carr has threatened to consider sanctions against Papua New Guinea if it abandons plans to hold mid-year elections.
PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill has pledged a full, free and fair election for late June but is facing calls - including from his own deputy - to delay.
Senator Carr yesterday hardened Australia's line on the government's plans. "It is absolutely vital that Papua New Guinea, that the government of Prime Minister O'Neill, commit unequivocally to this election," he told Sky News.
Failure to hold elections would create a "shocking model" for the Pacific.
"You've got Australia placed in a position where we'd have no alternative but to organise the world to condemn and isolate Papua New Guinea," he said. "We'd be in a position of having to consider sanctions. So I take this opportunity to urge the government to see that those elections take place, keeping Papua New Guinea in the cycle of five-yearly elections."
Read the full story at The Australian