Samoa resumes leadership battle as United Nations offers to help
Sydney, AustraliaReuters The United Nations has urged political leaders in Samoa to resolve a political crisis through dialogue after contested election results left the South Pacific nation with two leaders claiming to run the country. FAST party leader Fiame Naomi Mataafa was set to become Samoa’s first female prime minister with a court-approved one-seat parliamentary […]
Ousted Samoa PM refuses to cede power, despite election loss
Canberra, AustraliaReuters Samoa’s Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi said on Monday he would remain in office, despite an order by the country’s Supreme Court that lawmakers sit to appoint a new leader. Samoa’s Supreme Court last week overruled an attempt by the head of state Tuimalealiifano Vaaletoa Sualauvi II to void April’s election results which […]
Decorated with butterflies, infant-sized coffins sent to measles-ravaged Samoa
Sydney, AustraliaReuters Volunteers in the New Zealand city of Rotorua are preparing two dozen white-lined coffins to be transported to Samoa at the end of the week as the measles-ravaged Pacific island nation languishes under a growing death toll that has now hit 70. The smallest of the coffins, designed for the bodies of babies, […]
Samoa fights measles door-to-door in battle on anti-vaccination messages
Sydney, Australia Reuters Samoa on Thursday closed all non-essential public and private services for two days to combat a measles epidemic that has killed more than 60 people, mostly babies and children, in a battle complicated by a vocal anti-vaccination movement. The measles virus has infected more than 4,200 in the South Pacific nation of […]
Fiji to postpone sports contests as it battles measles outbreak
Reuters Fiji has asked its sports federations to postpone all competitions until January, in a bid to rein in the spread of a measles outbreak that has killed dozens in the neighbouring Pacific nation of Samoa. The highly infectious disease has been crossing the globe, recently finding a susceptible population in Samoa, where the official […]
Samoa in Christmas lockdown as measles deaths top 50
Wellington, New Zealand/Sydney, AustraliaReuters The small Pacific island nation of Samoa has closed schools and is restricting travel ahead of the Christmas holiday season as the death toll from a measles outbreak tops 50, in the latest flare-up of a global epidemic of the virus. The highly infectious disease has been crossing the globe, recently […]