Fiji’s miltary takeover – Prime Minister appeals to Australia for help

Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase called Mr Howard as the Fiji leader remained holed up in his Suva residence while troops, led by military commander Commodore Frank Bainimarama, took control of the city.

“I should inform you that this morning the prime minister of Fiji rang me and asked for Australian military intervention in response to the coup,” Mr Howard told reporters.

“I indicated to him that that would not be possible.

“We have previously communicated our position in that.

“I did not think it was in Australia’s interest to become involved.”

Meanwhile, Australians in Suva are being warned to leave the Fijian capital where troops appear set to arrest the Prime Minister.

And the Department of Foreign Affairs is urging Australians to reconsider any plans to travel to the Pacific nation saying its security could deteriorate without warning.

The department says any Australians who remain in Suva should avoid all government buildings .. military installations and concentrations of military personnel and keep their movements around the city to a minimum.

The Australian government allowed dependants of Australian High Commission staff to leave Suva last week.

This morning armed Fiji soldiers moved into downtown Suva this morning and the military began seizing government ministers’ vehicles, continuing what appears to be the first stages of a coup.

Soldiers are manning checkpoints and guarding roads around government offices and other key facilities in the Fijian capital.

At 6.30am (0530 AEDT,) about 20 soldiers in battle kit were positioned near roads bordering the old parliament complex, which houses offices of the prime minister and cabinet ministers.

Military checkpoints have been set up nearby on other roads leading to the complex.

Fiji commercial radio reported that soldiers earlier today removed two government vehicles used by ministers from the car park in the compound.

Land forces commander Lieutenant-Colonel Pita Driti was quoted as telling the broadcaster all minister’s vehicles would be seized, including that of Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase.

Soldiers fanned out all over Suva and in the western city of Nadi from late yesterday, setting up checkpoints on roads leading to the centre of Suva and near vital assets.

The military says the checkpoints are to ensure the public’s safety because of a potential threat from dissident groups.

There have been no reports from other sources of any resistance to the military.

Mr Qarase said he would meet President Ratu Josefa Iloilo this morning after soldiers turned away his vehicle from Government House late yesterday.

The prime minister said the soldiers had wanted him to walk from the entrance gate along an uphill driveway about 400 metres long.

“I refused to do that, so I came back,” Mr Qarase told the radio station.

The prime minister yesterday flew back to Suva by helicopter from a function outside the capital after a military checkpoint was set up on the road back.

Police bodyguards who drove Mr Qarase’s vehicle handed over their weapons to soldiers at the checkpoint.

Military commander Commodore Frank Bainimarama later said the bodyguards’ weapons had been returned.

Mr Driti said Mr Qarase’s flight home was unnecessary.

“The PM does not deserve a bullet, let alone be apprehended,” he told the Fiji Sun newspaper.

“We only wanted to disarm his bodyguards as part of the clean-up campaign.”

The campaign is Commodore Bainimarama’s term for forcing the government to meet a list of military’s demands.

The prime minister has called an emergency cabinet meeting today to discuss Commodore Bainimarama’s demands, which Mr Qarase says have changed.

But the commander has said the prime minister’s time is up and is demanding his resignation.

Yesterday Commodore Bainimarama, after receiving a communication from Iloilo, cut short a press conference in which he had been expected to announce his intentions.

Commodore Bainimarama instead briefly defended the army’s seizure of police weapons yesterday and refused to take questions.

One of Fiji’s three daily newspapers was not published today after management evacuated its building yesterday on reports of a military threat against the company.

The Daily Post is partly owned by the government and has taken a strong anti-military line in its editorials. 

Mr Qarase said later that the planned cabinet meeting this morning had been postponed.

The prime minister remains in his Suva residence and received a visit from Foreign Minister Kaliopate Tavola at 9.30am local time (0830 AEDT).

Mr Tavola arrived in a taxi and declined to comment on the current crisis.

Qorinasi Bale, Fiji’s attorney general, arrived a short time later.

Local radio reported seven government vehicles used by ministers and parliament’s Speaker had been confiscated by the military since last night.