The Commonwealth Secretariat in London said it had been asked for assistance by Bartholomew Ulufa’alu, the Prime Minister, and was sending Sitiveni Rabuka, former prime minister of Fiji, to visit the islands.The trouble centres on people from the island of Malaita, many of whom have migrated to the capital, Honiara, which is on Guadalcanal. Malaitans, who include the prime minister, dominate the government, civil service and business.Guadalcanal people complain of rising crime caused by the newcomers, whom they accuse of squatting on traditional homeland. Last weekend GLA militants drove Malaitans out of villages near Honiara.This week the island’s police commissioner, Frank Short, said that the violence had been localised and he was confident it would soon be brought under control.Three Malaitans were killed last Saturday when squatters on a palm-oil plantation east of the capital were attacked by GLA militants.Islanders have taken to setting up illegal roadblocks and Malaitans have responded by blocking roads in to Honiara amid rumours that it was soon to be attacked.Nick Hurley, the New Zealand High Commissioner to the Solomons, said yesterday that an uneasy calm had returned to the city despite the growing numbers of internally displaced people.His government had sent tarpaulins to shelter the refugees. The foreign ministries of New Zealand and Australia have advised travellers to avoid the islands.Yesterday the government offered to pay Guadalcanal landowners $1.7m (pounds 1m) in compensation the loss of their property, on condition that the militants of the GLA came forward to surrender their arms.In a message broadcast earlier in the week on the Solomon Islands Broadcasting Corporation, the GLA leader, Joseph Sangau, promised to surrender in return for a full amnesty for his supporters.But Mr Ulufa’alu insisted yesterday that no such amnesty would be granted.. THE FORMER South African president, Nelson Mandela, is next week expected to make his first appearance in the unofficial role of international peace-broker at a summit in Zambia aimed at ending the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Mr Mandela, who after Thabo Mbeki’s inauguration on Wednesday left yesterday for a holiday with his wife, Graca Machel, is expected in Lusaka on Saturday 26 June for the signing of a ceasefire deal, diplomats in Pretoria said yesterday.
President Mbeki’s inauguration provided African leaders linked to the conflict in DRC a chance to hold talks. “All the parties in the conflict now want to end the fighting.

We are now at the stage of looking at everyone’s sensitivities,” said a diplomat close to the talks yesterday.The talks, at the government guesthouse in Pretoria, were chaired by the Zambian leader, Frederick Chiluba, and attended by representatives of major players in the conflict: Sam Nujoma of Namibia, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Pasteur Bizimungu of Rwanda, Joachim Chissano of Mozambique, Banjamin Mkapa of Tanzania, Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Salim Ahmed Salim, secretary-general of the Organisation of African Unity, and President Mbeki.The embattled president of the former Zaire, Laurent-Desire Kabila, was represented by his presidential affairs minister, Victor Mpoyo. The rebels’ new leader, Emile Ilunga, is believed to have been in a separate guesthouse and to have used Sydney Mufamadi, the South African minister for provincial affairs, as an intermediary.The leaders agreed that they or their representatives would convene in the Zambian capital, Lusaka, on Monday for talks leading up to the signing of a ceasefire document on 26 June.. ONE OF South Africa’s most brash and controversial politicians, Nkosazana Zuma, became one of Africa’s most powerful women yesterday when President Thabo Mbeki named her foreign minister. But announcing the first cabinet of the post-Mandela era, the new South African leader did not fail to make a gesture towards the markets by reappointing the respected finance and trade ministers, Trevor Manuel and Alec Irwin.
The markets responded by strengthening the rand.The Inkatha Freedom Party leader, Mangosuthu Buthelezi, who remains minister for home affairs, allegedly turned down the deputy president’s post. This has been rendered largely ceremonial by the creation of a new “ministry to the presidency”, to be headed by Essop Pahad, a friend of Mr Mbeki’s since their days at Sussex University.

Jacob Zuma, the jovial second in command of the African National Congress – which holds two-thirds of seats in parliament after the latest election – takes the deputy president’s role. This means that two divorcees, Jacob and Nkosazana Zuma, will face each other once a week in cabinet meetings.Ms Zuma, who is seen by her supporters as frank and outspoken, is very close to Mr Mbeki – a factor which protected her in South Africa’s first democratic government, in which she was health minister and he was deputy president.A former ANC militant, she has often been at the centre of controversy, taking on the tobacco and pharmaceutical industries. She was once the subject of a scandal for her ministry’s sponsorship of a lavish Aids-awareness musical that cost a fifth of the government’s budget for fighting the disease.Mr Mbeki is expected to make the fight against HIV a personal campaign. He always wears an Aids ribbon and, in Pretoria yesterday, so did most of his cabinet members.An absentee in the appointments was Winnie Madikizela-Mandela who had been tipped for a government role after working hard during the ANC’s election campaign. Also missing were several ministers of the Mandela era with dissenting voices, such as Pallo Jordan and Derek Hanekom. This will confirm the view that Mr Mbeki intends to run a tight ship.The new president, 57 today, has appointed professionals to their own fields, such as Kader Asmal, a former teacher, who moves from a successful spell in water affairs to education.Mr Mbeki said his nominations were mainly a reshuffle, and that he was “not visualising any major changes in policy”..

THE UNITED Nations mission to East Timor uncovered a secret cache of weapons yesterday, as speculation increased that the planned referendum on the territory’s independence will be delayed due to a campaign of intimidation by pro-Indonesian militias. A team led by Ian Martin, the head of the UN Assistance Mission in East Timor (Unamet), discovered the weapons during a visit to the Liquisa district where thousands of villagers have been driven from their homes by armed members of the so-called Red and White Iron (Besi Merah Putih or BMP) militia. The militias, who support continuing rule over East Timor by the Indonesian government, are accused by local people of threatening to kill anyone who votes for independence.
Yesterday morning the Unamet team encountered a group of Besi Merah Putih in training on the outskirts of the town of Liquisa. The men, who were commanded by a former Indonesian soldier, denied they had weapons, but a UN policeman discovered a cache of home-made guns concealed in a nearby hut.According to local witnesses, the militia is actively supported by the Indonesian army and police. “We’ve raised reports of the Indonesian military not preventing actions by the BMP, but actually being involved with them,” Mr Martin said in Liquisa.