Written by Shalveen Chand RAROTONGA, 19 OCTOBER 2026 (COOK ISLANDS NEWS)—Exposing autocracy from military-ruled Fiji to democratic Samoa, seasoned journalist Shalveen Chand has faced cell blocks, state censorship and physical assaults for holding Pacific powers accountable. Now joining the Cook Islands News as senior journalist, Chand, the former editor of Samoa Observer, brings a relentless […]
Category: In Focus
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The Island That Disappeared From the Map — and the One That Never Appeared
By: Jack Huang On October 6, fourteen heads of government flew to Funafuti to look at the ocean. Not to negotiate with it, not to issue a joint statement about it. Just to look. Tuvalu’s runway sits two meters above sea level. At high tide, the Pacific doesn’t knock on the door. It simply arrives. […]
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Who restores the peace of our ancestors’ resting place? What is the price of our troubled hearts? A story of Non Economic Loss and Damage
NADI, 07 OCTOBER 2026 (SPREP)— Ms Nei Tikaeita comes from the bustling village of Rawannawi on the island of Marakei in Kiribati. For more than sixty years, she has walked the coastlines of Rawannawi. She knows the tides not by scientific instruments but from learning the patterns of coastal rhythms and an intimate knowledge of […]
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1.5 to Stay Alive not a slogan, but a lifeline for the Pacific
NADI, 05 OCTOBER 2026 (SPREP)—What happens when you wake up one day and your receding coastal land has now disappeared? Or the king tide last week, the week before and last month has made the drinking water supply from the well salty, and root crops can’t grow as big as before. For small islands states […]
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1.5°C Not Just a Number, It’s Survival for the Pacific
NEW YORK, 28 SEPTEMBER 2026 (SPREP)—For many countries, climate targets are policy goals. For Pacific Island nations, they are a matter of survival. That message echoed throughout the ‘Defending 1.5°C in an Age of Instability: Science, Strategy and Global Solutions,’ event hosted by Climate Analytics during New York Climate Week. Scientists, policymakers and climate advocates […]
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Op-Measles is making a comeback. Will we end it for good?
By Dr Saia Ma’u Piukala, WHO Regional Director for the Western Pacific For many years, measles felt like a disease of the past across the Western Pacific region. This did not happen by chance. It was the result of decades of political commitment, investment, and public health work that steadily pushed measles closer to elimination. […]