Fiji expels New Zealand and Australian diplomats (1st Lead)

Nov 3, 2009, 7:32 GMT

   Wellington - Fiji's military ruler Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama ordered senior diplomats of New Zealand and Australia to leave the country within 24 hours Tuesday and recalled his country's high commissioner in Canberra.

   In a televised address from the capital Suva, he accused the envoys of waging a negative campaign against his military government, which seized power in a bloodless coup in December 2006.

   Fiji's membership of the British Commonwealth and the Pacific Islands Forum has been suspended since Bainimarama's refusal to restore democracy and hold new elections. He has refused to hold new polls until late 2014.

   Bainimarama accused Australia and New Zealand of being 'engaged in a dishonest and untruthful strategy to undermine our judiciary, our independent institutions and our economy.'

   He accused the diplomats of 'refusing to engage with government and engaging only with those Fijians who have a political interest in holding Fiji back.'

   Bainimarama said a judge of Fiji's High Court, Anjala Wati, had been 'harassed and humiliated by the New Zealand High Commission in Fiji when she applied for a visa on medical grounds to take her baby son to New Zealand.'

   But the New Zealand High Commission in Suva issued its own statement, saying an application for a visa on medical grounds by Justice Wati was not rejected.

   The commission said the Wati family's passports were returned to the judge with visas attached, the Fiji Broadcasting Corporation reported.

   The New Zealand Press Association said it understood that Judge Wati was in Auckland, where her child was at the Starship Childrens' Hospital.