According to Countryaah.com, with capital city of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea is a country located in Melanesia with total population of 8,947,035.
State and politics
Papua New Guinea is an independent member of the Commonwealth, and the British Monarch is Head of State but is represented by a Governor General, appointed by Papua New Guinea’s single-chamber parliament for six years. Its 122 members are elected in general elections every five years. The 19 provinces have far-reaching self-government. A review of this began in 1992.
The many political parties reflect tribal affiliation rather than ideology. The 1997 elections resulted in a coalition government with Bill Skate (People’s National Congress) as head of government. Papua New Guinea for an active foreign policy in the Pacific region and in 1989 signed a cooperation agreement with ASEAN.
Judiciary
The legal system has been developed under the influence of English law, not least via Australia. The country’s highest court is The Supreme Court of Justice. The death penalty remains in the penal code but is de facto abolished in 1950. See ABBREVIATIONFINDER for how PG can stand for Papua New Guinea.
Human Rights
Papua New Guinea’s modern history is characterized by violent ethnic clashes and internal political abrasions (see History). Since independence in 1975, the young island nation has experienced several shifts of power, state of emergency and a nearly ten-year civil war between the government and the separatist movement from the neighboring island of Bougainville.
Respect for human rights is lacking in several areas. Corruption and abuse, such as torture and violence, characterize the police system and impunity is widespread. According to data from human rights organizations, the latest government under Peter O’Neill has made progress in increasing political transparency, but corruption is still widespread. However, freedom of expression and pressure are respected to a great extent.
In sharp contrast to the constitution, which prohibits discrimination on grounds of sex, women and girls are subjected to abuses to a large extent. Violence and abuse against women are largely socially accepted. To a large extent, girls are at risk of sexual abuse in the school environment. Pregnancy leads to a shutdown.
In general, women are considered and treated as inferior and disadvantaged in all legal aspects, as well as in economics and politics. Rape rarely leads to prosecution and human trafficking for both sexual purposes and housework. Children are also affected by the commercialized sex trade, which is believed to be increasingly prevalent.
LGBTQ persons are stigmatized in society and for acts of a gay character men are often sentenced to long prison terms.
Papua New Guinea
Between Asia and Oceania
Half of a huge island divided by colonizers like a cake, the state of Papua New Guinea seeks a balance between environmental conservation and economic well-being and also between traditional way of life and modern development. A difficult bet, for a country that lives only on the export of raw materials and which welcomes an extraordinary variety of cultures
Half an island, one state
Resulting from a history of colonial partition, the territory of Papua New Guinea corresponds to the eastern half of the large island of New Guinea, which is divided by an almost straight border, corresponding to a meridian. For ethnic and historical-political reasons, the country is considered part of Oceania, also because it includes a few hundred islands – some quite large – of Melanesia.
A large mountain range – whose peaks exceed 4,500 m – and some minor chains parallel to it run throughout the country from north-west to south-east and occupy a long eastern peninsula. The plains open to the north and south, respectively crossed by the Sepik and Fly rivers with their numerous tributaries.
The climate is tropical and monsoonal, hot and rainy, although the altitude considerably mitigates the temperatures in the mountainous parts.
A very rich and still well preserved vegetation hosts a large number of animal species, many of which are very rare elsewhere. Also from this point of view there is a great difference between the environment of the mountains, with tall forests and grasslands in the higher parts, and that of the coastal plains, occupied by mangrove forests and swamps.