Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare (centre) at the National Healing and Apology Week in Honiara. 2-7/ July/2016 Photo: Facebook - PM Press Secretariat
New legislation is being proposed in Solomon Islands to address outstanding issues from the ethnic conflict of more than a decade ago.
Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare said a reparation bill, based on the recommendations of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, would be tabled in parliament later this year.
The commission's report included first hand accounts of atrocities committed during the ethnic conflict of the late 1990s and early 2000s, as well as public contributions on its possible causes.
Completed in 2012 and handed over to the government of then-Prime Minister Gordon Darcy Lilo, the report was declared too sensitive for public consumption.
However, electronic copies of the it were unofficially released in 2013 by its editor and long time resident, Bishop Terry Brown .
Critics of the report however say the Truth and Reconciliation Commission failed to integrate local approaches to reconciliation and peace building, and therefore fell short of its ambitious mandate.
Mr Sogavare yesterday apologised for the ethnic crisis.
