town, southeast coast of Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea. Arawa is a planned suburban town on flatland near Arawa Bay. It was built to house the employees of Bougainville Copper Ltd., a mining company established in the late 1960s to run an open-pit mine at nearby Panguna. After Papua New Guinea gained its independence in 1975, Arawa became the administrative seat of North Solomons province; in 1997 the province was renamed Bougainville and its seat was moved to Buka Island. Nearby is the port town of Kieta.

In 1988 a secessionist uprising began on Bougainville, causing widespread violence, especially in the Arawa and Kieta region. Following years of fighting, a peace agreement was signed in Arawa in 2001, and the autonomous region of Bougainville was established in 2005. Pop. (latest est.) 14,900.