AUCKLAND: (Pacific Media Watch): Tonga's Cabinet Secretary Busby Kautoke has hit back at Fijian allegations of a breach of sovereignty with the latest statement from the Prime Minister's office.
Kautoke today responded to initial comments from Fiji's military leader Frank Bainimarama that the presence of the Tongan patrol boat Savea in Fiji waters was a breach of Fiji's sovereignty.
Bainimarama has called fugitive colonel Ratu Tevita Mara's "fishing incident" a calculated plan and an "illegal extraction".
In response, Kautoke maintained that the Mara rescue was a "humanitarian act" and accused Fiji of vandalising a Tongan navigational beacon in the Minerva Reef.
“At this lonely outpost, a perfectly innocent navigational beacon, erected on the wishes of our Late King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV for the benefit and safety of mariners, was officially vandalised," he said.
“Such an act, for example, cannot be elevated to the status of a legal argument and there is strong evidence to suggest that the full might of Fijian sea power, on the instructions of the military regime, was deployed to attack a defenceless and inanimate object.”
The Minerva Reef, otherwise known as the islands of Telekitonga and Telekitokelau, is about 490km south-west of Tonga.
The Chief Secretary said Bainimarama's comments would have been best left to official communications between the countries.
“Sovereignty should be considered separately as the subject of bilateral engagement between the Fiji regime and Tongan diplomats," he said.
Alex Perrottet
