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Map of Banaba (formerly Ocean Island)

Satellite imagery of Banaba Island from NASA

Banaba Island (pronounced /bəˈnɑːbə/) (also Ocean Island), an island in the Pacific Ocean, is a solitary raised coral island west of the Gilbert Island chain and 300 km east of Nauru. It is part of the Republic of Kiribati. It has an area of 5 km², and the highest point on the island is also the highest point in Kiribati, at 81 metres (266 feet) high. Along with Nauru and Makatea, it is one of the important elevated phosphate islands of the Pacific.

According to "Te Rii Ni Banaba—The Backbone of Banaba" by Raobeia Ken Sigrah, Banaban oral history supports the claim that the people of the Te Aka clan, which originated in Melanesia, were the original inhabitants of Banaba (Ocean Island), having arrived before the arrival of later migrations from the East Indies and Kiribati. The name Banaba in local tongues meant "stony". Sigrah makes the controversial (and politically loaded) assertion that Banabans are ethnically distinct from other I-Kiribati, and scientific evidence supports the fact that the Te Aka were not of Polynesian origin. The Banabans were assimilated only through forced migrations and the impact of the discovery of phosphate in 1900. There used to be 4 villages on the island - Ooma (Uma), Tabiang, Tapiwa (Tabwewa), and Buakonikai. The local capital was Tabiang, now called Antereen.

Phosphate-mining (for fertiliser) from 1900 to 1979 stripped away 90% of the island's surface. Japanese forces occupied the island from August 26, 1942 until the end of World War II in 1945.^[1] The British authorities relocated most of the population to Rabi Island, Fiji after 1945, with subsequent waves of migration in 1977 and 1981-1983. Some have subsequently returned, following the end of mining in 1979; approximately 200 were living on the island in 2001. Globally, there are an estimated 6000 individuals of Banaban descent.^[2] On Rabi Island the names of settlements are the same authentic four names from Banaba Island.

Banaba Island is a political anomaly. Despite being part of Kiribati, its municipal administration is by the Rabi Council of Leaders and Elders, which is based on Rabi Island, in Fiji.

On 19 December 2005, Teitirake Corrie, the Rabi Island Council's representative to the Parliament of Kiribati, said that the Rabi Council was considering giving the right to remine Banaba Island to the government of Fiji. This followed the disappointment of the Rabi Islanders at the refusal of the Kiribati Parliament to grant a portion of the A$614 million trust fund from phosphate proceeds to elderly Rabi islanders. Corrie asserted that Banaba is the property of their descendants who live on Rabi, not of the Kiribati government, asserting that, "The trust fund also belongs to us even though we do not live in Kiribati". He condemned the Kiribati government's policy of not paying the islanders.

On 23 December, Reteta Rimon, Kiribati's High Commissioner to Fiji, clarified that Rabi Islanders were, in fact, entitled to Kiribati government benefits - but only if they returned to Kiribati. She called for negotiations between the Rabi Council of Leaders and the Kiribati government.

On New Year's Day of 2006, Corrie called for Banaba to secede from Kiribati and join Fiji. Kiribati was using Banaban phosphate money for its own enrichment, he said; of the five thousand Banabans in Fiji, there were fewer than one hundred aged seventy or more who would be claiming pensions.

The stated wish of the Kiribati government to reopen mining on Banaba is strongly opposed by many in the Banaban diaspora.

Some of the leaders of the displaced Banaban community in Fiji have called for Banaba to be granted independence. One reason given for the maintenance of a community on Banaba, at a monthly cost of F$12,000, is that if the island were to become uninhabited, the Kiribati government might take over the administration of the island, and integrate it with the rest of the country. Kiribati is believed to be anxious to retain Banaba, in the hope of remining it in the future. Additionally, it is the only island in Kiribati that is not a low-lying coral atoll and less susceptible to rising sea levels.

• Banaba a semi-official resource on Banaba, covering history of Banabans and Banaba island, as well as recent news
• Banaba.co.uk
• Jane Resture has an informative Banaba site
• High resolution satellite image on Google Maps
• alternative free satellite image

Coordinates: 0°51′34″S, 169°32′13″E