Jun Shibata (Kamakura) Go to Jun Shibata's Fighting Alone Performance
1. Nauru Republic Pavilion
1. Nauru Rupublic Pavilion
Nauru is an island and republic in the central Pacific Ocean which is situated
just south of the equator. This island is in danger of extinction as a result
of American operations.
It is a raised coral island, oval in shape, with an area of 21.2 sq km (8.2 sq mi). The population is around 12,000, which is 58 percent Nauruans, 26 percent other Pacific Islanders, 8 percent Chinese, and 8 percent Europeans. The Nauruans are of mixed Polynesian, Micronesian, and Melanesian origin. About four-fifths of the people are Christians. Nauruan and English are the main languages.
The island, created by the excrement of the albatross, contains rich deposits of high-quality phosphate rock. In the mid-1980s approximately 1.6 million metric tons of phosphates were exported annually to Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, South Korea, and Japan, primarily for use in the manufacture of fertilizer. The Nauruans receive generous royalties for the mined phosphate, and this makes Nauru one of the richest, per capita, countries in the world. Most of the labor for this mining was done by foreign labors, so most of Nauruans worked as government officials, or were unemployed.
However, in the 1990s, almost
all the phosphate was mined, and Nauruans started to seek out a new industry.
Then, they started to create a new industry, which was finance. However, the
people in Nauru were amateurs in finance and their business was nothing but
risky. In the end, Nauru was used by Russian mafia and terrorists for money
laundering, causing the bankruptcy of the Nauru Republic. Moreover, the passport
of Nauru was often sold for money, so that most of the terrorists arrested inside
of the United States held Nauru passports.
Furthermore, Australia started to pay Nauru to take in refugees from Afghanistan, and so the small island became filled with refugees.
After September 11th, the United States tried to stop the flow of terrorist capital. The FBI started to destroy the phone lines of Nauru in the beginning of 2003. Also they started to seize and destroy all of the means of transportation such as ships and airplanes. Because of it, the Nauru Republic became completely cut off from the outside world for several months beginning on January 8, 2003. This operation was the top secret, and normal media did not report the critical situation of the Nauru Republic. At that time, an Australian telephone company visited Nauru to fix the telephone lines, but they lost communication even though they had a satellite phone.
The President of Nauru went to the United States for the treatment of heart disease at the same time, but he died in February 2003. Since the Chief of the Nation has disappeared, basic conditions in Nauru have deteriorated. Since Nauru imported almost all of its food, there is no enough food for all of them. The palace was set on fire, and refugees from Afghanistan started a hunger strike. However, because of the regulation of information, it is still hard to get truthful information about Nauru. The latest news says that Nauru was disorganized as a nation, and all the islanders wer exiled. Furthermore, the island will become a base for the US military.
While the media reported
the situation about whether or not the United States invade Iraq, already a
war was started in a different area of the world.
Bombing of Nauru and the disposal of the unexploded bomb by Native Nauruans
Nauru Republic Pavilion is an original work of Jun Shibata which keenly illustrate the flaw of highly informational society which emerged in 21st century, associated with the incident of Nauru Republic. The artist not only stays in the journalistic aspect, but also expands to manifold aspects which are something predominant and invisible.
(C) Copyright Shinya Watanabe