Papua New Guinea was an active the­atre dur­ing the Sec­ond World War, and the Aus­tralian gov­ern­ment main­tains the war ceme­tery at Lae even today in mem­o­ry of Aus­tralian sol­diers who lost their lives here dur­ing the con­flict. The som­bre area is a qui­et mark­er of recent his­to­ry of the region. There are also mark­ers of Indi­an and New Zealand sol­diers here, and is one of the mod­ern Papua New Guinea points of inter­est.