The islands Coconuts ( Coconuts Islands ), or in the past islands Keeling ( Keeling Islands ), are a coral Archipel of the Indian Ocean, formed around two principal atolls. They constitute since 1984 a territory external of the Australia, formally the “  Territory of the islands Coconuts   ” ( Territory off Coconuts Islands ).

The name shortened in English Cocos Islands is often supplemented by the name Keeling between brackets to distinguish it from other islands also named Coco elsewhere in the world, in the form Cocos (Keeling) Islands in many official documents and which one also usually translates into French Îles Coconuts (Keeling) .

Geography

The islands of Coconuts constitute a Australian Archipel of 14 km ² located in the Indian Ocean, with 800  km in the south-west of the island of Java (Indonesia), with 2768  km of Perth (Australia) and with 417  km in the west of the Christmas island.

The territory, about halfway between Australia and the Sri Lanka, includes/understands 27 coral island S, of which only two are habitées : the West island and the island Home.

• the Atoll of north, the North Keeling Island , and its neighbouring water belongs to the National park of Pulu Keeling .

• In the atoll of the south, one finds the 26 other islands. The islands of the atoll of the south have an entire surface of 1415  ha and the watery surface of the interior Lagon are of 110 km ². The capital of the archipelago is West Island.

The name of the archipelago, Coconuts Islands , was probably given because of the abundance of the coconuts, meaning “Coconut”. Indeed, with the thousands of coconuts cover these islands and the coconuts, cultivated in the whole of the atolls, constitute the only culture intended for export.

History

The official designation of the archipelago is “  today; Territory of the islands Coconuts   ” ( Territory off Coconuts Islands ). It is also called Keeling Islands in remembering William Keeling of the Company of Eastern India ( East India Company ), which visited the islands in 1609. The name of Keeling , generally placed between brackets, is used to distinguish this archipelago of the other Cocos islands existing elsewhere in the world.

In 1825, the captain John Clunies-Ross approached the islands Direction and Horsburgh and planted cereals there. The following year, it settled there with a crew of sailors indonésiens (of Malayan ethnos group) embarked since Sumatra and of the women of various nationalities. John Clunies-Ross and his family became the “  kings of Cocos  ” that they directed during more than one hundred fifty years.

Meanwhile, the government of the Great Britain had annexed the archipelago with the the United Kingdom in 1857, which did not prevent the queen Victoria in 1886 from granting exclusive privileges to the family of John Clunies-Ross. The workers indonésiens brought by the Clunies-Ross family were mainly employed as much for the treatment of the Coprah (desiccated flesh of coconut) that to be used the family as Clunies-Ross.

At the time of the Second world war, the presence of a garrison of almost 3  000 British soldiers gave the opportunity to Malayan to open towards the outside world. It was the period when the population of the islands was most important.

The Cocos islands passed in 1955 under control australien  ; the Coconuts (Keeling) Islands Act of 1955, modified later on until in 1979, remained the base of the systems administrative, legislative and legal of the archipelago. During the Seventies, about half of the islanders left the archipelago for the Australia.

The Clunies-Ross family was the single owner of the islands of 1886 with 1978, date on which the Australian government bought the grounds and gave them to the inhabitants. The ordinance on the local government of 1979 allowed the installation, as of the July 25th 1979, of the first elected temporary Advisory counsel. It was only in 1984 that the islanders voted to be integrated as an Australian external territory.

Administration

Since fastening with the Australia in 1984, the Australian government entrusted to a co-operative workers the management of the productive activities and endeavoured to make make up for at the small community of the Malais of Coconuts lost time which it had accumulated as regards public equipment, of education and opening to the outside world.

The Advisory counsel exerts responsibilities in many fields inside the Home island, where resides the Malayan community of Coconuts and its village (the Kampong , “  village  ” in Malayan). He advises the Australian administrator on any other matter relating to the Territory and gives opinions on the legislation which is proposed to him.

The inhabitants of Kampong do not pay a rent, nor of electricity; the municipal services are also free. The Malayan residents of Coconuts are Australian citizens.

Demography

The population of Coconuts is made up of some 625 inhabitants. The majority, is 68,8% of them, are Malais speaking the Malais about the Cocos  islands; ; they are a dialectal variety Malayan of Indonesia. The other islanders are the Australian ones (17,6%), called locally in English Aussies , and British (13,6%) speaking the English British or Australian English. Standard English is the official language.

The essence of the population of the West island, is the zone of the airport and of the administrative services, is of white race (Australian and British), whereas that of the island Home, a village called Kampong, is of Malayan origin, two communities being geographically separated by 10 km from Indian Ocean. The white population is Chrétienne (especially Anglican), the Malayan population, Musulmane.

Linguistic policy

Although the local authorities practice some Bilinguisme, one can speak about non-intervention, because from the legal point of view there does not exist official policy on this subject with Coconuts, contrary to the other Australian States and interior territories.

The Cocos (Keeling) Islands Act of 1955 (detaching the territory of the United Kingdom to be controlled then indirectly by Australia) does not contain any provision as regards language indeed. This status quo linguistic was not modified since official fastening in Australia in 1984.

The public life proceeds in English as much on behalf of the Advisory counsel that Australian Administration. However, when the Malayan ones are between them, they use only Malayan islands, even within the administration of the island Home (Kampong).

Education

Education is free and obligatory of the six years age up to fifteen.

The majority of the teachers exempting the English courses are Australian. In addition to the English, the teaching of the Malayan of Coconuts as language of support is authorized in the two elementary schools, just as its transcription in Arabic alphabet.

That of the West island is doubled, since 1980, of an establishment of secondary education attended by about fifteen children of the Home island. One can teach the Coran there, because the Malayan ones are Moslem and practice their worship in three small mosques.

Culture

A local Radio station endeavors to bring closer the two communities Asian and Anglo-Saxon by diffusing bilingual local programs (English and Malayan of the islands), as well as of the emissions and Malayan music coming from Radio-Australia.

Codes

the Islands Coconuts have as codes:

• CCK, according to the standard ISO 3166-1 (code list country),
• CCK, according to the code list AITA of the airports,

The international telephone indicative of the Islands Coconuts is 672.

See too

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