KEY POINTS:
A bond forged between Australia and its nearest neighbour, Papua New Guinea, amid the carnage of war is in danger of unravelling in a bitter dispute over plans for a gold mine on the famed Kokoda Trail battlefield.
Hundreds of wounded Australian infantry "diggers" owed their lives to
the stamina of native bearers known as "fuzzy wuzzy angels", who carried the injured men to medical aid posts on the tortuous jungle path during a bloody campaign against the Japanese in 1942.
But descendants of the fuzzy wuzzy angels say they live in poverty and are in desperate need of royalties from the mine to pay for schools, clinics and better housing. Their main source of income is from working as porters for trekking firms, earning around A$20 ($23) a day.
The Australian Government is appalled at the open-cut mine proposal. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who walked the track in 2006, said the plan "absolutely stinks".
Canberra wants the 96km track, which stretches across the razor-ridged Owen Stanley range of mountains, to be granted World Heritage status and for Papua New Guinea to block the mine.
Australians accord the Kokoda Trail almost mythic status because it was where the Japanese advance into the South Pacific was finally halted. Around 600 Australians lost their lives in battles which often degenerated into vicious hand-to-hand fights in cloying humidity and tangled jungle.
"The trail is one of the great Australian symbols," Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith said. "Australia has a very strong view that the Kokoda Trail needs to be protected."
Ironically, it is an Australian firm, Gold Coast-based Frontier Resources, which wants to dig up around 2km of the track to mine a gold and copper deposit estimated to be worth A$6.7 billion.
Walking the Kokoda Trail has become increasingly popular as a kind of pilgrimage for Australians, but for the past fortnight it has been blockaded by angry villagers who declared trekkers unwelcome. They waved placards which read: "What has Australia done for fuzzy wuzzies in 65 years?" and "Rudd wants fuzzy wuzzy angels to live in perpetual poverty".
Villagers said they would use force to stop any walkers who tried to pass them.
A spokesman, Barney Jack, claimed to represent 1000 villagers who he said were angry at the Australian Government's strong opposition to the mine.
Locals have been offered a 5 per cent stake in the venture and could stand to earn more than US$100 million over the mine's 10-year life. The blockade, about 55km northeast of Port Moresby, comes as this year's trekking season is about to start, with hundreds of Australians planning to brave the track's mud, leeches and steep gradients.
Frontier Resources has accused Canberra of acting in a high-handed manner in trying to block the mine. The company says that only a short section of the track would have to be diverted and it is unfair to expect PNG to preserve the entire trail in perpetuity while receiving little financial gain.
"The amount of damage that a mine here will cause to the track is minimal," managing director, Peter McNeil, told the ABC. "The track is 96km long, it's entirely privately owned. It's in a sovereign country and Australia had better get off its high horse."
The mine is likely to be high on the agenda when Rudd makes his first trip to PNG as Prime Minister next month.
Ross Babbage, of the Kokoda Foundation, a security think tank, said the battles for the Kokoda Trail and Milne Bay, to the east, were significant because they were the first time the Japanese had been defeated on land in World War II. "I hope a compromise can be reached," he said. "I'm all for the economic development of PNG but also that the track not be violated."
The Kokoda Track Foundation, which supports communities along the trail, said though the mine might benefit a few villagers, others could see their livelihoods wrecked if the number of trekkers dwindled.
"A massive open-cut copper mine may benefit the owners of the land on which the mine is centred but could put at risk the livelihoods of thousands of other villagers who rely on the tourism drawn to the track," said foundation chairman Patrick Lindsay.
The track was PNG's greatest tourist asset and the Government should carefully weigh up the likely environmental impact of the mine.
"The potential cataclysmic damage to the intricate rivers systems and delicate ecosystems of the region demands careful investigation," Lindsay said.
A trekking guide and New South Wales MP, Charlie Lynn, said a creek had already been badly polluted by exploratory mining work.