Read the latest news from regional and global sources, presenting different voices and perspectives.
Trump has opened the deep sea for business, risking fragile environments we know nothing about
Salon
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May 21, 2025
When the submarine plunged to about 1,500 meters below sea level, ecologist Jeff Drazen asked the pilots to cut the strobe lights that had been guiding them through the pitch-black waters. For a moment, they continued falling to the sea floor in...
Pacific Tourism Organisation Board Approves Key Resolutions to Strengthen Regional Tourism Governance and Sustainability
Pacific Tourism Organisation
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May 19, 2025
The Pacific Tourism Organisation (SPTO) Board of Directors convened this week to deliberate on strategic and operational matters critical to the effective management of the organisation and the sustainable development of tourism in the region....
Concern in Samoa about deep sea mining around Am Samoa
Talanei
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June 9, 2025
Samoa Conservation Society President James Atherton has called for great care after the United States government announced plans to consider a lease for deep sea mining off shore of American Samoa. Samoa Observer newspaper reports Atherton said...
'Act responsibly for humankind' — Palau president on deep sea mining
Samoa News
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June 10, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — Palau's president says the US to fast-track deep sea mining is not a good idea. Deep sea mining frontrunner The Metals Company (TMC) has since confirmed it will not apply for a mining license through the International...
Concerns raised regarding deep-seabed mining in Am Samoa waters
Samoa News
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June 9, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — Opposition from members of the public has continued to pour in regarding deep-seabed mining on or around American Samoa’s offshore waters since the Department of the Interior moved to consider issuing or selling a...
Wealth beneath the waves: US takes a step toward promoting deep-sea mining amid concerns in the Pacific
The Pacific Island Times
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June 11, 2025
Around 16,404 feet beneath the northern Pacific Ocean, the whole seabed—stretching around 4,500 miles from east to west—is littered with potato-sized chunks of what look like charcoal lumps called polymetallic nodules. Rich in metals such as...
Under pressure: pessimism ahead of session of Seabed Authority
Cosmos
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June 11, 2025
The International Seabed Authority continues the 30th session meetings at the end of this month, meeting in various sessions almost every day until a full Assembly in Kingston, Jamaica, from 21 to 25 July. The provisional agenda of the Assembly...
Budget Office requests $15 million from ARPA to cover reduction in FY2026 budget
Talanei
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June 10, 2025
The Executive Branch is absorbing a reduction of $30 million in the proposed Fiscal Year 2026 budget for ASG, and then Acting Budget Director Satia Aokuso Satia requested $15 million in ARPA funding to help cover the reduction. Satia made the...
Hawaiʻi Scientist Has Bad — And Good — News About Future Of Coral Reefs
Honolulu Civil Beat - Hawaii
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June 11, 2025
As coral reefs undergo a fourth global mass bleaching event, marine scientists have been studying whether new reefs might form in higher latitudes as the tropics become too warm. Tropical reefs might look like inanimate rock, but these colorful...
ASEPA participates in Circle Expo 2025 in Samoa
Samoa News
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June 6, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — The American Samoa Environmental Protection Agency (AS-EPA) represented American Samoa in this year's inaugural Circularity, Innovation, Recovery, Culture, Learning, and Environment (CIRCLE) Expo 2025 hosted by the...
DOH seeks to regulate tattooing activités in the Territory
Samoa News
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June 6, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — The Department of Health (DOH) is initiating a regulatory framework to oversee tattooing activities throughout the territory. This will encompass commercial tattoo parlors as well as culturally traditional tattooing...
Marine energy: Harnessing the power of the Atlantic
Atlantic Council
·
June 10, 2025
Issue Brief June 10, 2025 • 9:02 am ET Print this page Marine energy: Harnessing the power of the Atlantic By William Yancey Brown Following a decade-long partnership, the Policy Center for the New South and the Atlantic Council have joined forces...
ASEPA participates in Circle Expo 2025
Talanei
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June 5, 2025
American Samoa’s ban on the importation and sale of polystyrene foam containers was the topic of a presentation by staff of the American Samoa Environmental Protection Agency at an event hosted by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional...
“A POTATO-SHAPED ROCK”, this is what deep sea mining is all about
Samoa News
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June 5, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — The waters around the Pacific Ocean territory are estimated to contain large amounts of potato-shaped rocks filled with the building blocks for electric vehicles and other electronics. Deposits of these polymetallic...
We Are Not a Democracy
Canada Free Press
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The elements of American civics are taught in every high school in the nation; we do not need the taxpayer expense to fund these trips to expose outsiders to our American “democracy.” I was strolling through Colonial Williamsburg in Virginia when...
Growing opposition to seabed mining
Talanei
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June 4, 2025
A former Director of Education and former Director of Marine and Wildlife Resources has added her voice to those opposing seabed mining in waters in and around American Samoa. Dr Ruth Matagi-Tofiga, an educator and biologist said in a statement,...
WestPac reviews Monument policy shifts
Samoa News
·
June 10, 2025
HONOLULU — (June 04, 2025) The Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council is convening June 9–11 in Honolulu to review major federal policy changes that could reshape fisheries access across the Pacific Islands, and to take final action...
Former Gov. Lolo asks Amata to lead charge against deep-sea mining
Samoa News
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June 4, 2025
Pago Pago, AMERICAN SAMOA — Former Governor Lolo Matalasi Moliga has appealed to Congresswoman Uifa’atali Aumua Amata to consider the negative impact of deep-sea mining near the waters of American Samoa, and “lead our charge to ward off...
Seabed mining proposal on agenda of Fisheries Council
Talanei
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June 5, 2025
When the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council convenes June 9–11 in Honolulu one of the issues on the agenda is seabed mining offshore American Samoa The Council will hear from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) on a new...
Eight out of 18 graduates of PHS receive ASG scholarships
Talanei
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June 6, 2025
Eight of the 18 graduates of Pacific Horizons School have been awarded ASG scholarships. Six are off-island scholarships and two are for study at the American Samoa Community College. The scholarship recipients signed their letters of award with...