Fiji’s military has expanded its grip over the island despite an announcement by Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama last Saturday that the military government would be ending its three-year state of emergency . . . the military dictatorship has enacted new legislation that allows the government to ban images, makes meetings without a permit subject to a $10,000 fine or 5 year prison sentence, exempts the law from review by the courts and expands the authority of police officers to members of the Fiji military . . . it also allows people to be arrested without a warrant and kept in prison for up to two weeks without access to a court if they are suspected of threatening “public safety or [violating] the peace” . . . Fiji was suspended from the British Commonwealth in 2009 a month after a court declared the military regime illegal and after Bainimarama refused to hold elections by 2010 . . . this new legislation is likely an attempt by Bainimarama to maintain his control over the island . . . the new decree makes it even more unlikely Australia lift sanctions on Fiji.