PARIS (Reuters) - The French archipelago of New Caledonia in the South Pacific voted 59.5 percent against independence from France in a referendum on Sunday, with two thirds of the ballots counted, local TV station NC La 1ere reported on its website.

It said that participation rate stood at 80.7 percent. Full results were due from 1130 GMT onwards.

The referendum, the result of a 30-year long decolonization process, is the first auto-determination vote to be held in a French territory since Djibouti in the Horn of Africa voted for independence in 1977.