The United Nations Mission on Bougainville (the UNOMB) will remain on the Papua New Guinea island for another six moths.
Here's our reporter, Anita Purcell......
"At yesterdays ceremony marking the withdrawl of the Peace Monitoring Group, the director of the UNOMB, Noel Sinclair, said the departure of the Peace Monitoring Group is just the beginning for the UN observers. Mr Sinclair says that over the next six months his group will work with the Bougainville Transitional Team to complete the weapons disposal programme. The civilian Bougainville Transitional Team will be a small team of fifteen monitors and will be led by Australia. Mr Sinclair says also that the two groups will focus on persuading Bougainvilleans to hand in weapons still in circulation. While eighteen hundred weapons registered with the PMG were surrendered by ex-combatants, there is still a large number of unregistered guns in Bougainville. Mr sinclair says it is important for Bougainvilleans to put away their weapons as part of their continuing committment to the full implementation of the peace agreement."
