Riots underline Papua New Guinea's social and economic fragility

Looting in Port Moresby follows decades of urban squalor and neglect

20240118 Papua New Guinea Violence

A man shows the damage on Jan. 11 after looters tore through a shopping center in Port Moresby. The riots began after police walked off the job over a pay dispute. © AP

HAMISH MCDONALD, Contributing writer

SYDNEY -- Just over a year ago, Port Moresby's main hospital was revealed to be storing the bodies of deceased patients in an open shed because its refrigerated morgue was full.

A hasty mass burial was organized, but bodies have continued to overflow. As the head of the Papua New Guinea doctors association, James Naipao, has pointed out, the hospital was designed to serve 400,000 people, the official population of Papua New Guinea's capital, but residents now number about 1.3 million.

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