13 May 2008

PNG's Prime Minister reportedly met Taiwan's foreign minister

10:18 am on 13 May 2008

Papua New Guinea's Prime Minister, Sir Michael Somare, reportedly met Taiwanese Foreign Affairs Minister, James Huang, when he was in Singapore for his medical check-up last year.

The Post Courier newspaper reports that this was confirmed by Mr Huang minutes before he resigned last week over the diplomatic cash scandal in which 30 million US earmarked by Taipei for aid in PNG went missing.

The chairman of the PNG Public Accounts Committee, Timothy Bonga and private lawyer Florian Gubon, have been linked to the scandal but so fare only Minister for National Planning Paul Tiensten has admitted meeting with one of the Taiwanese accused of involvement.

However the opposition has called on Sir Michael Somare to come clean on what happened because the people named are all linked to his government and political party.