Thrusting is well documented in the Finisterre/Sarawaget moun- tains, the Kainantu-Waf district and in the Highlands between
the Kubor Anticline and the Ramu Valley, Papua New Guinea.
The thrusts trend NW and involve rocks ranging in age from
Permo-Triassic to Plio-Pleistocene. Evidence from the Finisterre/
Sarawaget mountains demonstrates that a major phase of thrust- ing commenced in Pliocene times and continues today. Palaeostress analyses is a sensitive technique for assessing the
kinematic history of faulting. The picture gained from the
Finisterre/Sarawaget mountains, the Kainantu district and be- tween Kundiawa and Keglsugl is simple, involving a north to
northeast ol. Local complexities between the upper Chimbu Valley and Brahmin indicate extension on a NW-N trend. The
simplicity of this anlaysis, which accords with seismic and geo- detic strain data, shows that the major faulting in Papuan Orogen
is no different from that in the Papuan Fold Belt; that the Papuan
Orogen and the Papuan Fold Belt together form a young thrust- fold complex; and that such structures as the Kubor Anticline
may be fault-bend folds. Recognition of the obduction of the Finisterre/Sarawaget reef/
volcanic complex over the Australian plate, the gas seeps in the
Ramu Valley and foothills of the Finisterre/Sarawaget Mountains,
oil seeps in the Goroka and Kundiawa regions, and our interpre- tation of the PNG Orogen as part of the Papuan Fold Belt indi- cates unexpected probability that the PNG Highlands are pro- spective for hydrocarbons.