PORT MORESBY, Oct 9, 2007 (AFP) - Papua New Guinea authorities were urged to stamp out violence against women Tuesday after reports of a horrific attack in which a pregnant mother's baby was pulled from her womb.

More than 50 women, many dressed in black, attended parliament as the country's only woman MP, Community Development Minister Dame Carol Kidu, presented a petition calling for more action to end violence against women.

Kidu cited a horrifying incident where a woman was badly beaten by her husband then had her unborn child ripped from her womb.

PORT MORESBY, Aug 28, 2007 (AFP) - Police and health workers in Papua New Guinea launched an investigation Tuesday into reports that AIDS victims in the rugged South Pacific nation are being buried alive by their relatives.

Romanus Pakure, deputy director of the government's National Aids Council, said the allegations were 'a wake-up call' and that police were heading to the sites with health officials.

'I am shocked, the chairman of the council was shocked, we really need to investigate this and verify all these things,' he said.

PORT MORESBY, Aug 27, 2007 (AFP) - Some AIDS victims are being buried alive in Papua New Guinea by relatives who cannot look after them and fear becoming infected themselves, a health worker said Monday.

Margaret Marabe, who spent five months carrying out an AIDS awareness campaign in the remote Southern Highlands of the South Pacific nation, said she had seen five people buried while still breathing.

PORT MORESBY, Aug 16, 2007 (AFP) - The descendants of cannibals who killed and ate four Fijian missionaries in 1878 have apologised for their forefathers' actions, the Australian Associated Press reported Thursday.

Fiji's High Commissioner to Papua New Guinea, Ratu Isoa Tikoca, accepted the apologies at a reconciliation ceremony attended by thousands of people near Rabaul in East New Britain province on Wednesday.

'We at this juncture are deeply touched and wish you the greatest joy of forgiveness as we finally end this record disagreement,' Tikoca said.

PORT MORESBY, Aug 13, 2007 (AFP) - Papua New Guinea's veteran leader Michael Somare was re-elected prime minister Monday after winning a huge majority in parliament.

Somare, 71, gained the support of 86 out of 109 members of parliament elected by a national vote last month, enabling him to form a coalition government.

Among those who remained on the opposition benches were former prime ministers Julius Chan and Mekere Morauta and Somare's sacked former treasurer Bart Philemon.

MOUNT HAGEN, Papua New Guinea, Aug 4, 2007 (AFP) - The way a woman walks can be a death sentence in Papua New Guinea, where the ancient world of witchcraft has collided brutally with the modern plague of AIDS.

Women accused of being witches have been tortured and murdered by mobs holding them responsible for the apparently inexplicable deaths of young people stricken by the epidemic, officials and researchers say.

How the women are singled out for such a fate can be as cruel as their treatment, said Joe Kanekane of PNG's Law and Justice Sector Secretariat.

PORT MORESBY, July 22, 2007 (AFP) - A strong earthquake with a magnitude of 5.9 struck off the coast of Papua New Guinea on Sunday, but there were no immediate reports of damage or a tsunami.

The undersea quake struck 44 kilometres (25 miles) east of the town of Vanimo in the Pacific nation, near the border with Indonesia, the US Geological Survey said.

It hit at 8:49 pm local time (1049 GMT) at a depth of 35 kilometres.