Bougainville fought a war to shut down Panguna mine. Now it wants to reopen it

Thousands of alluvial miners have set up crude camps in the abandoned pit of the Panguna mine in Bougainville. Panguna was once one of the world’s most lucrative copper and goldmines; now many who fought to close it want it reopened. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

Noah Doko rubs absent-mindedly at a scar slashed across his forearm. The former rebel fighter sits amid the crumbling remains of the former Panguna village in Bougainville, beneath the hills that were the hideout and battleground of his youth.

As a teenager, he was shot by the Papua New Guinea defence force: ostensibly by his own military, by a fellow citizen. In the aftermath of the Bougainville civil war, he was elected to parliament to represent veterans.