MEDIA
The main radio and TV stations are operated by the privately-owned Pitt Media Group, which also publishes weekly newspapers.
Radio Australia broadcasts on FM on Rarotonga.
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TIMELINE
Some key dates in the history of the Cook Islands:
1596 - Spaniard Alvaro de Mendana is the first European to sight the islands.
Rarotonga is the largest of the Cook IslandsImage copyrightAFP/GETTY IMAGES
Image caption
Rarotonga is the largest of the Cook Islands
1773 - Captain James Cook explores the islands and names them the Hervey Islands. Fifty years later they are renamed in his honour.
1821 - English and Tahitian missionaries arrive, become the first non-native settlers.
1888 - Cook Islands are proclaimed a British protectorate and a single federal parliament is established.
1901 - Islands are annexed to New Zealand.
1946 - Legislative Council is established. For the first time since 1912, the territory has direct representation.
1965 - Islands become a self-governing territory in free association with New Zealand.
Cook Islands' dancers in traditional dressImage copyrightAFP/GETTY IMAGES
Image caption
Cook Islands dancers in traditional dress
1985 - Agreement on creating a South Pacific nuclear-free zone - the Rarotonga Treaty - is opened for signing on the main island.
2012 - The Cook Islands announces the creation of the world's largest marine reserve - a one million-sq-km (411,000-sq-mile) swathe of the Pacific Ocean.