An initial hearing of a class action against mining giant Rio Tinto over the toxic legacy of the Panguna copper mine on the autonomous island of Bougainville has been held in Papua New Guinea.
The lawsuit against Rio Tinto and its subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) is seeking compensation, expected to be in the billions of dollars, for what plaintiffs allege is historic mismanagement of the massive open copper-and-gold mine between 1972 and 1989.
More than 5000 claimants backed by anonymous investors are seeking damages for the destruction that sparked a 10-year-long civil war.
The Panguna mine closed in 1989 after anger about pollution and the unequal distribution of profits sparked a landowner rebellion. As many as 20,000 people — or 10 percent of Bougainville’s population — are estimated to have died in the violence that followed between pro-inependence rebels and PNG.
Although a peace process was brokered in 2001 with New Zealand support, deep political divisions remain and there has never been remediation for Panguna’s environmental and psychological scars.
The initial hearing for the lawsuit took place on Wednesday, a day ahead of schedule, at the National Court in Port Moresby, said Matthew Mennilli, a partner at Sydney-based Morris Mennilli.
Mennilli, who is from one of two law firms acting on behalf of the plaintiffs, said he was unable to provide further details as court orders had not yet been formally entered.
A defence submitted
Rio Tinto did not respond to specific questions regarding this week’s hearing, but said in a statement on September 23 it had submitted a defence and would strongly defend its position in the case.
The lawsuit is made up by the majority of villagers in the affected area of Bougainville, an autonomous province within PNG, situated some 800km east of the capital Port Moresby.
Martin Miriori, the primary litigant in the class action lawsuit, photographed in Bougainville, June 2024. Image: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP
At least 71 local clan leaders support the claim, with the lead claimant named as former senior Bougainville political leader and chief of the Basking Taingku clan Martin Miriori.
The lawsuit is being bankrolled by Panguna Mine Action, a limited liability company that stands to reap between 20-40 percent of any payout depending on how long the case takes, according to litigation funding documents cited by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.
While the lawsuit has support from a large number of local villagers, some observers fear it could upset social cohesion on Bougainville and potentially derail another long-standing remediation effort.
The class action is running in parallel with an independent assessment of the mine’s legacy, supported by human rights groups and the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG), and funded by Rio Tinto.
Locals walk by buildings left abandoned by a subsidiary of Rio Tinto at the Panguna mine site, Bougainville taken June 2024. Image: Aubrey Belford/OCCRP
Rio Tinto agreed in 2021 to take part in the Panguna Mine Legacy Impact Assessment after the Melbourne-based Human Rights Law Centre filed a complaint with the Australian government, on behalf of Bougainville residents.
Legacy of destruction
The group said the Anglo-Australian mining giant has failed to address Panguna’s legacy of destruction, including the alleged dumping of more than a billion tonnes of mine waste into rivers that continues to affect health, the environment and livelihoods.
The assessment, which is being done by environmental consulting firm Tetra Tech Coffey, includes extensive consultation with local communities and the first phase of the evaluation is expected to be delivered next month.
ABG President Ishmael Toroama has called the Rio Tinto class action the highest form of treason and an obstacle to the government’s economic independence agenda.
“This class action is an attack on Bougainville’s hard-fought unity to date,” he said in May.
In February, the autonomous government granted Australian-listed Bougainville Copper a five-year exploration licence to revive the Panguna mine site.
The Bougainville government is hoping its reopening will fund independence. In a non-binding 2019 referendum — which was part of the 2001 peace agreement — 97.7 percent of the island’s inhabitants voted for independence.
PNG leaders resist independence
But PNG leaders have resisted the result, fearful that by granting independence it could encourage breakaway movements in other regions of the volatile Pacific island country.
Former New Zealand Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae was appointed last month as an independent moderator to help the two parties agree on terms of a parliamentary vote needed to ratify the referendum.
In response to the class action, Rio Tinto said last month its focus remained on “constructive engagement and meaningful action with local stakeholders” through the legacy assessment.
The company said it was “seeking to partner with key stakeholders, such as the ABG and BCL, to design and implement a remedy framework.”
This week marked the grim one-year anniversary of the surprise October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and the beginning of the Israeli war on Gaza — a conflict that has taken a devastating toll on journalists and media outlets in Palestine, reports the International Press Institute.
In Gaza, Israeli strikes have killed at least 123 journalists (Gaza media sources say 178 killed) — the largest number of journalists to be killed in any armed conflict in this span of time to date.
Dozens of media outlets have been leveled. Independent investigations such as those conducted by Forbidden Storieshave found that in several of these cases journalists were intentionally targeted by the Israeli military — which constitutes a war crime.
Over the past year IPI has stood with its press freedom partners calling for an immediate end to the killing of journalists in Gaza as well as for international media to be allowed unfettered access to report independently from inside Gaza.
In May, IPI and its partner IMS jointly presented the 2024 World Press Freedom Hero award to Palestinian journalists in Gaza. The award recognised the extraordinary courage and resilience that Palestinian journalists have demonstrated in being the world’s eyes and ears in Gaza.
This week, IPI renewed its call on the international community to protect journalists in Gaza as well as in the West Bank and Lebanon. Allies of Israel, including Media Freedom Coalition members, must pressure the Israeli government to protect journalist safety and stop attacks on the press.
This also includes the growing media censorship demonstrated by Israel’s recent closure of Al Jazeera’s Ramallah bureau.
Raising awareness
IPI was at the UN in Geneva this week with its partners Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Reporters without Borders (RSF), and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), and others for high-level meetings aimed at raising awareness of the continued attacks on the press and urging the international community to protect journalists.
Among the key messages: The continued killings of journalists in Gaza — and corresponding impunity — endangers journalists and press freedom everyone.
On this sombre anniversary, the joint advert in this week’s Washington Post honours the journalists bravely reporting on the war, often at great personal risk, and underscores IPI’s solidarity with those that dedicate their lives to uncovering the truth.
— Washington Post Press Freedom Partnership (@wppressfreedom) October 7, 2024
“But it is clear that solidarity is not enough. Action is needed,” said IPI in its statement.
“The international community must place effective pressure on the Israeli authorities to comply with international law; protect the safety of journalists; investigate the killing of journalists by its forces and secure accountability; and grant international media outlets immediate and unfettered access to report independently from Gaza.
“We urge the international community to meet this moment of crisis and stand up for the protection of journalists and freedom of the press in Gaza.
“An attack against journalists anywhere is an attack against freedom and democracy everywhere.”
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.
ABC’s The Pacific has gained rare access into West Papua, a region ruled by Indonesia that has been plagued by military violence and political unrest for decades.
Now, as well as the long-running struggle for independence, some say the Melanesian region’s pristine environment is under threat by the expansion of logging and mining projects, reports The Pacific.
As Indonesia prepares to inaugurate a new President, Prabowo Subianto, a man accused of human rights abuses in the region, West Papua grapples with a humanitarian crisis.
The Pacific talks to indigenous Papuans in a refugee settlement about being displaced, teachers who want change to the education system and locals who have hope for a better future.
A spokesman for the Indonesian Foreign Ministry told The Pacific that Indonesia was cooperating with all relevant United Nations agencies and was providing them with up to date information about what is happening in West Papua.
French Polynesia’s president and civil society leaders have called on the United Nations to bring France to the negotiating table and set a timetable for the decolonisation of the Pacific territory.
More than a decade after the archipelago was re-listed for decolonisation by the UN General Assembly, France has refused to acknowledge the world’s peak diplomatic organisation has a legitimate role.
France’s reputation has taken a battering as an out-of-touch colonial power since deadly violence erupted in Kanaky New Caledonia in May, sparked by a now abandoned French government attempt to dilute the voting power of indigenous Kanak people.
Pro-independence French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson told the UN Decolonisation Committee’s annual meeting in New York on Monday that “after a decade of silence” France must be “guided” to participate in “dialogue.”
“Our government’s full support for a comprehensive, transparent and peaceful decolonisation process with France, under the scrutiny of the United Nations, can pave the way for a decolonisation process that serves as an example to the world,” Brotherson said.
Brotherson called for France to finally co-operate in creating a roadmap and timeline for the decolonisation process, pointing to unrest in New Caledonia that “reminds us of the delicate balance that peace requires”.
The 121 islands of French Polynesia stretch over a vast expanse of the Pacific, with a population of about 280,000, and was first settled more than 2000 years ago.
Often referred to as Tahiti after the island with the biggest population, France declared the archipelago a protectorate in 1842, followed by full annexation in 1880.
France last year attended the UN committee for the first time since the territory’s re-inscription in 2013 as awaiting decolonisation, after decades of campaigning by French Polynesian politicians.
French Permanent Representative to the UN Nicolas De Rivière responds to French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson at the 79th session of the Decolonisation Committe on Monday. Image: UNTV
“I would like to clarify once again that this change of method does not imply a change of policy,” French permanent representative to the UN Nicolas De Rivière told the committee on Monday.
“There is no process between the state and the Polynesian territory that reserves a role for the United Nations,” he said, and pointed out France contributes almost 2 billion euros (US $2.2 billion) each year, or almost 30 percent of the territory’s GDP.
After the UN session, Brotherson told the media that France’s position is “off the mark”.
17 speakers back independence
French Polynesia was initially listed for decolonisation by the UN in 1946 but removed a year later as France fought to hold onto its overseas territories after the Second World War.
Granted limited autonomy in 1984, with control over local government services, France retained administration over justice, security, defence, foreign policy and the currency.
Seventeen pro-independence and four pro-autonomy – who support the status quo – speakers gave impassioned testimony to the committee.
Lawyer and Protestant church spokesman Philippe Neuffer highlighted children in the territory “solely learn French and Western history”.
“They deserve the right to learn our complete history, not the one centred on the French side of the story,” he said.
“Talking about the nuclear tests without even mentioning our veterans’ history and how they fought to get a court to condemn France for poisoning people with nuclear radiation.”
France conducted 193 nuclear tests over three decades until 1996 in French Polynesia.
‘We demand justice’
“Our lands are contaminated, our health compromised and our spirits burned,” president of the Mururoa E Tatou Association Tevaerai Puarai told the UN denouncing it as French “nuclear colonialism”.
“We demand justice. We demand freedom,” Puarai said.
He said France needed to take full responsibility for its “nuclear crimes”, referencing a controversial 10-year compensation deal reached in 2009.
Some Māʼohi indigenous people, many French residents and descendants in the territory fear independence and the resulting loss of subsidies would devastate the local economy and public services.
Pro-autonomy local Assembly member Tepuaraurii Teriitahi told the committee, “French Polynesia is neither oppressed nor exploited by France.”
“The idea that we could find 2 billion a year to replace this contribution on our own is an illusion that would lead to the impoverishment and downfall of our hitherto prosperous country,” she said.
Published in the Christchurch Star newspaper yesterday — this was the advert rejected last week by Stuff, New Zealand’s major news website, by an editorial management which apparently thinks pro-Israel sympathies are more important than the industrial-scale slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza and Lebanon.
Stuff told the Palestinian Solidarity Movement Aotearoa (PSNA) on Thursday last week it would not print this full-page “genocide in their own words” advertisement which had been booked and paid to go in all Stuff newspapers this week.
Stuff gave no “official” reason for banning the advert about Israel’s war in Gaza aside from saying they would not do so “while the ongoing conflict is developing”.
It seems that for Stuff, pro-Israel sympathies are more important that Palestinian realities.
It’s worth pointing out that Stuff has, over many years, printed full page advertisements from a Christian Zionist, Pastor Nigel Woodley, from Hastings.
Woodley’s advertisements have been full of the most egregious, fanciful, misinformation and anti-Palestinian racism.
Our advertisement on the other hand is 100 percent factual and speaks truth to power – demanding the New Zealand government hold Israel to account for its war crimes and 76-years of brutal military occupation of Palestine.
On Tuesday 1 October, JD Vance and Tim Walz debated for two painful hours in a bid to claim the spot for vice-president in the US presidential election. And like every US democratic charade, it was two white guys waving their dicks around with genocidal hard-ons. Or, as one person on X accurately put it regarding Israel:
The vice presidential debate started with the two candidates having a dick measuring contest on who loves Israel more.
No mention of the hurricane in the south, no condolences to the families of the dead, nothing. You’d think they’re running for president of Israel.
Israel’s ability to be able to defend itself is absolutely fundamental
Maybe Tim Walz skipped the international law lesson, or maybe he’s hoping we all forgot about it. Israel, as the occupying force in Palestine, does not have the right to self defence.
According to Analyst News, in October 2022 the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory concluded that:
the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories was illegal under international law due to its permanence and the Israeli government’s de-facto annexation policies
Therefore, under international law – Israel does not have the right to self-defence. This is contrary to what they, and the majority of the west have been claiming for the last year.
Even more worrying though, was how Walz continued:
The expansion of Israel and it’s proxies is an absolute fundamental necessity for the United States to have the steady leadership there
Walz is effectively giving Israel permission to invade, kill and destroy whoever the fuck they want – at whatever cost. Because ultimately, it will further the US’s colonialist agenda, and make their friends rich:
We’re like 15 minutes into the Walz/Vance “debate” & already they’ve agreed that Israel can do whatever the fuck it wants including a preemptive strike on Iran & are competing for killing the planet faster through extracting more fossil fuels. Madness
Supporting a genocidal regime is characteristic of the US, given its consistent history of doing so. The US has long been a major destabilising force in the world. It’s litany of US-backed coups is a testament to this.
Also entirely on brand, is the role the US is playing in wars in the middle east more generally. Whether its for oil and gas or just to further its capitalist goals – both VP candidates cheering this on is nothing new:
#israel is their colonial outpost, destabilising the middle east in order to bully Arabs into complacency. It’s their pet monster and it needs blood to grow. The US is the biggest terrorist organization in the world. https://t.co/S5mY9kXxtW
Right now, the US is partnering with Israel in a horrific genocide in Gaza, a genocide condemned by the overwhelming majority of nations, and not a WORD about it in the #VPDebate!!! #VPDebate2024
Where there are weapons to be sold, there is money to be made:
Why anyone regards this crime syndicate disguised as a democracy!!! with any respect is the craziest thing on this planet. It’s an Empire ruled by the power of the weapons… https://t.co/cyBjPuusdY
There’s a term for two vice-presidential candidates cheering on mass murder of civilians in foreign occupied territories – and it’s state-sponsored terrorism:
the biggest terrorist the world has seen last 100+ years.
always fighting cowardly; targeting civilians.
However, the media has normalised these genocidal maniacs so effectively, that many citizens in the US wouldn’t have bat an eye:
And people carried on watching like that was totally normal. Western citizens need to wake up to the evil their leaders are making them complicit it. Because it is not the leaders that will suffer the consequences. https://t.co/IkDaxrCQIg
— Marked safe from Western Propaganda (@b_tella) October 2, 2024
When it comes down to it, there’s not a fag paper between these Israel-abetting candidates of the United States of imperialism and terror:
Tim Walz and JD Vance got along so well because they both agree that we should plunge the world into World War 3 in order to protect Israel
American democracy is cooked. These frauds agree on most important shit so the entire debate is filled with irrelevant gotcha questions
— Revolutionary Blackout Network (@SocialistMMA) October 2, 2024
Can’t watch the debate. All I care about is the holocaust Israel and the US are carrying out around the clock against my people.
Both VP candidates supporting genocide – isn’t a good look, is it?
At the end of the day, the US election is a political farce at best. But at worst, it’s just another colonial chest-beating contest between two party’s perfectly content to give arms to war criminals brutally murdering people wherever their genocidal, annexing urge takes them next. To the US’s imperialistic establishment, money talks louder than the screams of over 16,000 dead children.
Racism, torture and arbitrary arrests are some examples of discrimination indigenous Papuans have dealt with over the last 60 years from Indonesia, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch.
“I have heard about this day to day racism since I had my first Papuan friend when I was in my 20s in my college, it means that over the last 40 years, that kind of story keeps on going on today,” Harsono said.
“Regarding torture again this is not something new.”
The report said infant mortality rates in West Papua in some instances are close to 12 times higher than in Jakarta.
Pemerintah Indonesia seharusnya meninjau kebijakan soal Papua Barat, mengakui dan mengakhiri sejarah rasisme sistematis terhadap orang asli Papua, minta pertanggungjawaban dari mereka yang bertanggung jawab atas pelanggaran hak-hak orang Papua https://t.co/JfnAZhsi0Epic.twitter.com/lzB6n0zrJ5
Papuan children denied education
Papuan children are denied adequate education because the government has failed to recruit teachers, in some instance’s soldiers have stepped into the positions “and mostly teach children about Indonesian nationalism”.
It said Papuan students find it difficult to find accommodation with landlords unwilling to rent to them while others were ostracised because of their racial identity.
In March, a video emerged of soldiers torturing Definus Kogoya in custody. He along with Alianus Murib and Warinus Kogoya were arrested in February for allegedly trying to burn down a medical clinic in Gome, Highland Papua province.
According to the Indonesian army, Warinus Kogoya died after allegedly “jumping off” a military vehicle.
President-elect Prabowo Subianto’s takes government next month.
Harsono said the report was launched yesterday because of this.
“We want this new [Indonesian] government to understand the problem and to think about new policies, new approaches, including to answer historical injustice, social injustice, economic injustice.”
Subianto’s poor human rights record
Harsono said Subianto has a poor human rights record but he hopes people close to him will flag the report.
He said current President Joko Widodo had made promises while he was in power to allow foreign journalists into West Papua and release political prisoners, but this did not materialise.
When he came to power the number of political prisoners was around 100 and now it’s about 200, Harsono said.
He said few people inside Indonesia were aware of the discrimination West Papuan people face, with most only knowing West Papua only for its natural beauty.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Until recently, Elon Musk was just a wildly successful electric car tycoon and space pioneer. Sure, he was erratic and outspoken, but his global influence was contained and seemingly under control.
But add the ownership of just one media platform, in the form of Twitter — now X — and the maverick has become a mogul, and the baton of the world’s biggest media bully has passed to a new player.
What we can gauge from watching Musk’s stewardship of X is that he’s unlike former media moguls, making him potentially even more dangerous. He operates under his own rules, often beyond the reach of regulators. He has demonstrated he has no regard for those who try to rein him in.
Under the old regime, press barons, from William Randolph Hearst to Rupert Murdoch, at least pretended they were committed to truth-telling journalism. Never mind that they were simultaneously deploying intimidation and bullying to achieve their commercial and political ends.
Musk has no need, or desire, for such pretence because he’s not required to cloak anything he says in even a wafer-thin veil of journalism. Instead, his driving rationale is free speech, which is often code for don’t dare get in my way.
This means we are in new territory, but it doesn’t mean what went before it is irrelevant.
A big bucket of the proverbial If you want a comprehensive, up-to-date primer on the behaviour of media moguls over the past century-plus, Eric Beecher has just provided it in his book The Men Who Killed the News.
Alongside accounts of people like Hearst in the United States and Lord Northcliffe in the United Kingdom, Beecher quotes the notorious example of what happened to John Major, the UK prime minister between 1990 and 1997, who baulked at following Murdoch’s resistance to strengthening ties with the European Union.
In a conversation between Major and Kelvin MacKenzie, editor of Murdoch’s best-selling English tabloid newspaper, The Sun, the prime minister was bluntly told: “Well John, let me put it this way. I’ve got a large bucket of shit lying on my desk and tomorrow morning I’m going to pour it all over your head.”
MacKenzie might have thought he was speaking truth to power, but in reality he was doing Murdoch’s bidding, and actually using his master’s voice, as Beecher confirms by recounting an anecdote from early in Murdoch’s career in Australia.
In the 1960s, when Murdoch owned The Sunday Times in Perth, he met Lang Hancock (father of Gina Rinehart) to discuss potentially buying some mineral prospects together in Western Australia. The state government was opposed to the planned deal.
Beecher cites Hancock’s biographer, Robert Duffield, who claimed Murdoch asked the mining magnate, “If I can get a certain politician to negotiate, will you sell me a piece of the cake?” Hancock said yes.
Later that night, Murdoch called again to say the deal had been done. How, asked an incredulous Hancock. Murdoch replied: “Simple [. . . ] I told him: look you can have a headline a day or a bucket of shit every day. What’s it to be?”
Between Murdoch in the 1960s and MacKenzie in the 1990s came Mario Puzo’s The Godfather with Don Corleone, aided by Luca Brasi holding a gun to a rival’s head, saying “either his brains or his signature would be on the contract”.
Musk and his platform are to this election what Rupert Murdoch and Fox News were to past Republican campaigns—cynical manipulators and poisonous propaganda machines, pumping lies and outrage into the American political bloodstream. https://t.co/UsS4q3jaRf
— Frank-STOP-Christian-Nationalists-Schaeffer (@Frank_Schaeffer) September 19, 2024
Changing the rules of the game Media moguls use metaphorical bullets. Those relatively few people who do resist them, like Major, get the proverbial poured over their government. Headlines in The Sun following the Conservatives’ win in the 1992 election included: “Pigmy PM”, “Not up to the job” and “1001 reasons why you are such a plonker John”.
If media moguls since Hearst and Northcliffe have tap-danced between producing journalism and pursuing their commercial and political aims, they have at least done the former, and some of it has been very good.
The leaders of the social media behemoths, by contrast, don’t claim any Fourth Estate role. If anything, they seem to hold journalism with tongs as far from their face as possible.
They do possess enormous wealth though. Apple, Microsoft, Google and Meta, formerly known as Facebook, are in the top 10 companies globally by market capitalisation. By comparison, News Corporation’s market capitalisation now ranks at 1173 in the world.
Regulating the online environment may be difficult, as Australia discovered this year when it tried, and failed, to stop X hosting footage of the Wakeley Church stabbing attacks. But limiting transnational media platforms can be done, according to Robert Reich, a former Secretary of Labor in Bill Clinton’s government.
Despite some early wins through Australia’s News Media Bargaining Code, big tech companies habitually resist regulation. They have used their substantial influence to stymie it wherever and whenever nation-states have sought to introduce it.
Meta’s founder and chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, has been known to go rogue, as he demonstrated in February 2021 when he protested against the bargaining code by unilaterally closing Facebook sites that carried news. Generally, though, his strategy has been to deploy standard public relations and lobbying methods.
But his rival Musk uses his social media platform, X, like a wrecking ball.
Musk is just about the first thing the average X user sees in their feed, whether they want to or not. He gives everyone the benefit of his thoughts, not to mention his thought bubbles. He proclaims himself a free-speech absolutist, but most of his pronouncements lean hard to the right, providing little space for alternative views.
Kamala wants to destroy your right to free speech under The Constitution https://t.co/oJN5T8nPLn
Some of his tweets have been inflammatory, such as him linking to an article promoting a conspiracy theory about the savage attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of the former US Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, or his tweet that “Civil war is inevitable” following riots that erupted recently in the UK.
As the BBC reported, the riots occurred after the fatal stabbing of three girls in Southport. “The subsequent unrest in towns and cities across England and in parts of Northern Ireland has been fuelled by misinformation online, the far-right and anti-immigration sentiment”.
Nor does Musk bother with niceties when people disagree with him. Late last year, advertisers considered boycotting X because they believed some of Musk’s posts were anti-Semitic. He told them during a live interview to “Go fuck yourself”.
He has welcomed Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s presidential nominee, back onto X after Trump’s account was frozen over his comments surrounding the January 6, 2021, attack on the capitol. Since then both men have floated the idea of governing together if Trump wins a second term.
Is the world better off with tech bros like Musk who demand unlimited freedom and assert their influence brazenly, or old-style media moguls who spin fine-sounding rhetoric about freedom of the press and exert influence under the cover of journalism?
That’s a question for our times that we should probably begin grappling with.
The man behind the 2000 coup in Fiji, George Speight, and the head of the mutineers, former soldier Shane Stevens, have been granted presidential pardons.
In a statement yesterday, the Fiji Correction Service said the pair were among seven prisoners who has been granted pardons by the President, Ratu Wiliame Katonivere, after recommendations by the Mercy Commission.
“These pardons were formally granted on 18 September 2024. As a result, the named individuals have been officially discharged from custody today, Thursday, 19 September 2024,” the statement said.
“The Fiji Correction Service and the government remain committed to the principles of justice, rehabilitation, and the rule of law, and the Mercy Commission plays a vital role in ensuring that petitions for clemency are considered carefully, with due regard to the circumstances of each case.”
Speight was serving a life sentence for the charge of treason while Stevens was serving a life sentence for the charge of mutiny.
Also released are Sekina Vosavakatini, Nioni Tagici, James Sanjesh Goundar, Adi Livini Radininausori and John Miller.
Speight sought pardon In June 2023, Speight had applied for a presidential pardon under a mercy clause, raising the possibility of his release from prison after serving more than 20 years of a lifetime sentence.
Speight’s 2000 coup was the only civilian to raise an armed group to overthrow the government.
In 2002, Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka — who started the coup culture in Fiji with two coups in 1987 — had stated a pardon for Speight would be a catastrophe and could pave the way for more coups.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
French police have shot and killed two men in New Caledonia, stoking tensions with pro-independence groups days ahead of a public holiday marking France’s annexation of the Pacific archipelago.
The pro-independence FLNKS (Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front) decried the deaths yesterday as “barbaric and humiliating methods” used by French police resulting in a “summary execution” and called for an independent investigation.
The shootings bring the number of deaths in the Pacific territory to 13 since unrest began in May over French government changes to a voting law that indigenous Kanak people feared would compromise their push for independence.
The men were killed in a confrontation between French gendarmerie and Kanak protesters in the tribal village of Saint Louis, a heartland of the independence movement near the capital Nouméa.
Public Prosecutor Yves Dupas said in a media statement the police operation using armoured vehicles was to arrest suspects for attempted murder of officers and for armed robbery on the Saint Louis road, with “nearly 300 shots noted in recent months.”
“The two deceased persons were the subject of a search warrant, among a total of 13 persons implicated, sought and located in the Saint Louis tribe,” Dupas said, adding they had failed to respond to summonses.
Dupas ordered two investigations, one over the attempted murders of police officers and the second into “death without the intention of causing it relating to the use of weapons by the GIGN gendarmerie (elite police tactical unit) and the consequent death of the two persons sought”.
Push back ‘peaceful solution’
Union Calédonienne (UC) secretary-general Dominique Fochi said yesterday the actions of French security forces “only worsen the situation on the ground and push back the prospect of a peaceful solution.”
Pro-independence Union Calédonienne secretary-general Dominique Fochi addresses the media yesterday. Image: Andre Kaapo Ihnim/Radio Djiido
“The FLNKS denounces the barbaric and humiliating methods used by the police, who did not hesitate to carry out a summary execution of one of the young people in question,” Fochi read from a FLNKS statement at a press conference.
“We demand an immediate de-escalation of military interventions in the south of our country, particularly in Saint Louis, where militarisation and pressure continue on the population, which can only lead to more human drama.”
The statement called for an immediate “independent and impartial investigation to shed light on the circumstances of these assassinations in order to establish responsibilities”.
Prosecutor Dupas said police came under fire from up to five people during the operation in Saint Louis and responded with two shots.
“The first shot from the policeman hit a man, aged 30, positioned as a lone sniper, who was wounded in the right flank. The second shot hit a 29-year-old man in the chest,” Dupas said, adding three rifles and ammunition had been seized.
One of the men died at the scene, while the other escaped and later died after arriving at a local hospital.
For many Kanaks, the anniversary is a reminder of France’s brutal colonisation of the archipelago that is located roughly halfway between Australia and Fiji.
Paris has beefed up security ahead of Citizenship Day, with High Commissioner Louis Le Franc saying nearly 7000 French soldiers, police and gendarmes are now in New Caledonia.
“I have requested reinforcements, which have been granted,” he told local station Radio Rythme Bleu last week.
“This has never been seen before, even during the toughest times of the events in 1984 and 1988 — we have never had this,” he said, referring to a Kanak revolt in the 1980s that only ended with the promise of an independence referendum.
Authorities have also imposed a strict curfew from 6 pm to 6 am between September 21-24, restricted alcohol sales, the transport of fuel and possession of firearms.
Kanaks make up about 40 percent of New Caledonia’s 270,000 people but are marginalised in their own land — they have lower incomes and poorer health outcomes than Europeans who make up a third of the population and occupy most positions of power in the territory.
UN decolonisation process
New Caledonia voted by modest majorities to remain part of France in referendums held in 2018 and 2020 under a UN-mandated decolonisation process. Three votes were part of the Noumea Accord to increase Kanaks’ political power following deadly violence in the 1980s.
A contentious final referendum in 2021 was overwhelmingly in favour of continuing with the status quo.
However, supporters of independence have rejected its legitimacy due to very low turnout — it was boycotted by the independence movement — and because it was held during a serious phase of the covid-19 pandemic, which restricted campaigning.
Earlier this year, the president of Union Calédonienne proposed Septemnber 24 as the date by which sovereignty should be declared from France. The party later revised the date to 2025, but the comments underscored how self-determination is firmly in the minds of local independence leaders.
The unrest that erupted in May was the worst outbreak of violence in decades and has left the New Caledonian economy on the brink of collapse, with damages estimated to be at least 1.2 billion euros (US $1.3 billion).
The UN General Assembly has overwhelmingly passed a resolution demanding that the Israeli government end its occupation of Palestinian territories within 12 months — but half of the countries that voted against are from the Pacific.
Affirming a recent International Court of Justice opinion that deemed the decades-long occupation unlawful, the opposition from seven Pacific nations further marginalised the region from world opinion against Israel.
The final vote tally was 124 member states in favour and 14 against, with 43 nations abstaining.
Pacific countries that voted with Israel and its main ally and arms-supplier United States against the Palestinian resolution are Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Palau, Tonga and Tuvalu.
Kiribati, Samoa and Vanuatu abstained while Solomon islands voted yes. Australia abstained while New Zealand and Timor-Leste also supported the resolution.
The Palestine-led resolution, co-sponsored by dozens of nations, calls on Israel to swiftly withdraw “all its military forces” from Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.
Palestine is a permanent observer state at the UN and it described the vote as “historic”.
The court’s opinion had been sought in a 2022 request from the UN General Assembly.
The UNGA vote comes amid Israel’s devastating war on Gaza, which has killed more than 41,250 Palestinians.
The United Kingdom, which recently suspended some arms export licenses for Israel, abstained from yesterday’s vote, a decision that the advocacy group Global Justice Now (GJN) said shows “complete disregard for the ongoing suffering of Palestinians forced to live under military-enforced racial discrimination”.
However, other US allies such as France voted for the resolution. Australia, Germany, Italy and Switzerland abstained but Ireland, Spain and Norway supported the vote.
“The vast majority of countries have made it clear: Israel’s occupation of Palestine must end, and all countries have a definite duty not to aid or assist its continuation,” said GJN’s Tim Bierley.
“To stay on the right side of international law, the UK’s dealings with Israel must drastically change, including closing all loopholes in its partial arms ban and revoking any trade or investment relations that might assist the occupation.”
NEWS: UN General Assembly adopts resolution demanding that Israel brings to an end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory without delay and within the next 12 months.https://t.co/Vj0Ve1lLBipic.twitter.com/2rKKvDNDqd
BDS welcomes vote
The Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) Movement welcomed passage of the resolution, noting that the UN General Assembly had voted “for the first time in 42 years” in favour of “imposing sanctions on Israel”, reports Common Dreams.
The resolution specifically calls on all UN member states to “implement sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against natural and legal persons engaged in the maintenance of Israel’s unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territory, including in relation to settler violence.”
The resolution’s passage came nearly two months after the ICJ, or World Court, the UN’s highest legal body, handed down an advisory opinion concluding that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories is illegal and must end “as rapidly as possible.”
The newly approved resolution states that “respect for the International Court of Justice and its functions . . . is essential to international law and justice and to an international order based on the rule of law.”
The Biden administration, which is heavily arming the Israeli military as it assails Gaza and the West Bank, criticised the ICJ’s opinion as overly broad.
Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), said in a statement that “the Biden administration should join the overwhelming majority of nations around the world in condemning these crimes against the Palestinian people, demanding an end to the occupation, and exerting serious pressure on the Israeli government to comply”.
“We welcome this UN resolution demanding an end to one of the worst and ongoing crimes against humanity of the past century,” said Awad.
The UN General Assembly votes for the end to Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory and for sanctions . . . an overwhelming “yes”. Image: Anadolu/Common Dreams
Turning ‘blind eye’
Ahead of the vote, a group of UN experts said in a statement that many countries “appear unwilling or unable to take the necessary steps to meet their obligations” in the wake of the ICJ’s opinion.
“Devastating attacks on Palestinians across the occupied Palestinian territory show that by continuing to turn a blind eye to the horrific plight of the Palestinian people, the international community is furthering genocidal violence,” the experts said.
“States must act now. They must listen to voices calling on them to take action to stop Israel’s attacks against the Palestinians and end its unlawful occupation.
“All states have a legal obligation to comply with the ICJ’s ruling and must promote adherence to norms that protect civilians.”
Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem in the 1967 war and subsequently annexed the entire holy city in 1980, reports Al Jazeera.
International law prohibits the acquisition of land by force.
Israel has also been building settlements — now home to hundreds of thousands of Israelis — in the West Bank in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which bans the occupying power from transferring “parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies”.
The armed faction of the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB) kidnapped Phillip Merhtens, a 38-year-old pilot working for the Indonesian internal feeder airline Susi Air, in February last year after he landed a small commercial plane in a remote, mountainous area.
It is now asking the New Zealand government, including the police and army, to escort the pilot and for local and international journalists to be involved in the release process.
Both Foreign Affairs and the minister’s office say they are aware of the proposed plan.
In a statement, they say their focus remains on securing a peaceful resolution and the pilot’s safe release.
“We continue to work closely with all parties to achieve this and will not be discussing the details publicly.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The Guardian reports that Indonesian human rights advocate Andreas Harsono, who covers the country for Human Rights Watch, said the proposal was “realistic”, despite Indonesia’s ongoing restriction on reporters and human rights monitors in the region.
“The top priority should be to release this man who has a wife and kids,” The Guardian quoted Harsono as saying.
West Papua’s armed group issued a proposal to release a New Zealand hostage, asking more than a dozen foreign journalists and rights monitors to be present in Wamena and Jayapura to witness the process https://t.co/4LAYNiipaLpic.twitter.com/yhRKYsX605
Sebby Sambom, the TPN-PB spokesman, and Terianus Satto, a general affairs chief of the armed group, state that they issued a proposal to release the New Zealand pilot unconditionally but need witnesses to secure the release in West Papua pic.twitter.com/dg8InXQo6h
The International Press Institute (IPI) has strongly condemned the Israeli government’s recent decision to revoke the press passes of Al Jazeera journalists, months after the global news outlet was banned in the country.
“The Israeli government’s decision to revoke Al Jazeera press passes highlights a broader and deeply alarming pattern of harassment of journalists and attacks on press freedom in Israel and the region,” IPI interim executive director Scott Griffen said.
Nitzan Chen, director of Israel’s Government Press Office (GPO), announced the decision via X on Thursday, accusing Al Jazeera of spreading “false content” and “incitement against Israelis”.
Use of press office cards in the course of the journalists’ work could in itself “jeopardise state security at this time”, claimed Chen.
The journalists affected by the decision would be given a hearing before their passes are officially revoked.
While the GPO press card is not mandatory, without it a journalist in Israel will not be able to access Parliament, Israeli government ministries, or military infrastructure.
Only Israeli recognised pass
It is also the only card recognised at Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank.
Griffen said the move was indicative of a “systematic effort” by Israeli authorities to “expand its control over media reporting about Israel, including reporting on and from Gaza”.
He added: “We strongly urge Israel to respect freedom of the press and access to information, which are fundamental human rights that all democracies must respect and protect.”
At the time, Al Jazeera described it as a “criminal act” and warned that Israel’s suppression of the free press “stands in contravention of international and humanitarian law”.
GPO Director Nitzan Chen: “Al Jazeera disseminates false content, which includes incitement against Israelis and Jews and constitutes a threat to IDF soldiers. Use of GPO cards in the course of the journalists’ work could in itself jeopardize state security at this time”.
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Media freedom petition rejected A petition for military authorities to allow foreign journalists to report inside Gaza was rejected by the Israeli Supreme Court in January 2024.
IPI and other media watchdogs have repeatedly called on Israel to allow international media access to Gaza and ensure the safety of journalists.
Mairav Zonszein, a senior Israeli analyst at the International Crisis Group, told Al Jazeera that the attack was something that Israel had had in the works for several months and risked losing if Hezbollah became suspicious.
This concern may have led the Israeli army to trigger the blasts, but Israel’s strategy overall remains unclear.
“Where is Israel going to go from here? This question still hasn’t been answered,” Zonszein said.
“Without a ceasefire in Gaza, it’s unclear how Israel plans to de-escalate, or if Netanyahu is in fact trying to spark a broader war,” the analyst added, noting that more Israeli troops were now stationed in the West Bank and along the northern border than in the Gaza Strip.
In a historic moment, Palestine, newly promoted to observer status at the UN General Assembly (UNGA), has submitted a draft resolution at the body demanding an end to Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian territories.
Building on a recent International Court of Justice ruling, the resolution calls for Israel to withdraw its troops, halt settlement expansion, and return land taken since 1967 within 12 months.
While the US opposes the resolution, it has no veto power in the UNGA, and the body has previously supported Palestinian recognition.
The resolution, which will be voted on by UNGA members today, is not legally binding, but reflects global opinion as leaders gather for high-level UN meetings next week.
Fears of potential unrest on New Caledonia’s symbolic September 24 date have prompted stronger restrictions in New Caledonia and the deployment of large numbers of French security personnel.
The date originally marked what France termed the “taking of possession” of New Caledonia in 1853.
Since 2004, what the pro-independence Kanak movement has been calling for years “a day of mourning”, was consensually renamed “Citizenship Day” by the local government in a move to foster a sense of inclusiveness and common destiny.
Since the riots emerged, UC leader Daniel Goa publicly claimed he intended to use the date to declare unilaterally the French Pacific archipelago’s independence.
While the overall situation of New Caledonia has been slowly returning to some kind of normalcy and despite some pockets of resistance and roadblocks, including in the Greater Nouméa area, the French High commission on Friday announced a package of restrictions, combining the current curfew (10pm to 5am) with new measures.
‘I am being prudent’
High Commissioner Louis Le Franc told local media: “There is considerable force to ensure that law and order will prevail . . . I am being prudent.
“I have asked for reinforcements and I have got them”, he told local anti-independence radio RRB on Friday.
He said it is more than what was ever sent to New Caledonia during the hardest moments of 1984-1988 when the territory was in a state of insurrection.
Le Franc detailed that the security contingent deployed would comprise “almost 7000” personnel, including mobile gendarmes, police (to “protect sensitive areas”) and military.
General Nicolas Mathéos, who heads the French gendarmes in New Caledonia, also stressed he was determined.
Speaking on Monday to local TV Caledonia, he said the reinforcements came as the French) state “has put in every necessary means to ensure this 24 September and the days before that take place in a climate of serenity”.
“New Caledonia now needs serenity. It needs to rebuild. It needs to believe in its future after this violent crisis,” he said.
Numbers ‘in control’
“We will be in numbers to hold the territory, to control it, including on the roads, so that this day is a day of peace.
“Because no one wants to go through again the nightmare of May.”
The general said reinforcements had already arrived.
“For the gendarmerie, this is almost 40 units mobilised.
“Public order will be maintained, on September 24, before September 24 and after September 24.”
General Nicolas Mathéos, head of French gendarmes in New Caledonia, speaking to TV Caledonia on September 16. Image: TV Caledonia screenshot
The curfew itself, which had been gradually relaxed over the past few weeks, is now returning to a stricter 6pm-6am duration for the whole of New Caledonia, specifically concerning the September 21-24 period (a long weekend).
Additional measures include a ban on all public meetings within Nouméa and its outskirts.
Firearms, alcohol banned
Possession, transportation and sale of firearms, ammunition and alcohol also remain prohibited until September 24.
Fuel distribution and transportation is subject to restrictions, the French High Commission said in a release on Friday.
High Commissioner Louis Le Franc told local media that the measures were taken due to the current circumstances and the appearance of some posts seen on social media which “call on public order disturbances on 24 September 2024”.
“Under those circumstances, a ban on circulation…is a measure that can efficiently prevent disruption of public order,” he said.
The restrictions, however, do not apply to persons who can provide evidence that they need to move within the prohibited hours for professional, medical emergency, domestic or international air and sea travel reasons.
Meanwhile, a bipartisan delegation from New Caledonia is scheduled to travel to Paris next week to meet high officials, including the presidents of both Houses of Parliament, French media has reported.
New Caledonia’s delegation is scheduled to travel from September 23 to October 4.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Fears of potential unrest on New Caledonia’s symbolic September 24 date have prompted stronger restrictions in New Caledonia and the deployment of large numbers of French security personnel.
The date originally marked what France termed the “taking of possession” of New Caledonia in 1853.
Since 2004, what the pro-independence Kanak movement has been calling for years “a day of mourning”, was consensually renamed “Citizenship Day” by the local government in a move to foster a sense of inclusiveness and common destiny.
Since the riots emerged, UC leader Daniel Goa publicly claimed he intended to use the date to declare unilaterally the French Pacific archipelago’s independence.
While the overall situation of New Caledonia has been slowly returning to some kind of normalcy and despite some pockets of resistance and roadblocks, including in the Greater Nouméa area, the French High commission on Friday announced a package of restrictions, combining the current curfew (10pm to 5am) with new measures.
‘I am being prudent’
High Commissioner Louis Le Franc told local media: “There is considerable force to ensure that law and order will prevail . . . I am being prudent.
“I have asked for reinforcements and I have got them”, he told local anti-independence radio RRB on Friday.
He said it is more than what was ever sent to New Caledonia during the hardest moments of 1984-1988 when the territory was in a state of insurrection.
Le Franc detailed that the security contingent deployed would comprise “almost 7000” personnel, including mobile gendarmes, police (to “protect sensitive areas”) and military.
General Nicolas Mathéos, who heads the French gendarmes in New Caledonia, also stressed he was determined.
Speaking on Monday to local TV Caledonia, he said the reinforcements came as the French) state “has put in every necessary means to ensure this 24 September and the days before that take place in a climate of serenity”.
“New Caledonia now needs serenity. It needs to rebuild. It needs to believe in its future after this violent crisis,” he said.
Numbers ‘in control’
“We will be in numbers to hold the territory, to control it, including on the roads, so that this day is a day of peace.
“Because no one wants to go through again the nightmare of May.”
The general said reinforcements had already arrived.
“For the gendarmerie, this is almost 40 units mobilised.
“Public order will be maintained, on September 24, before September 24 and after September 24.”
General Nicolas Mathéos, head of French gendarmes in New Caledonia, speaking to TV Caledonia on September 16. Image: TV Caledonia screenshot
The curfew itself, which had been gradually relaxed over the past few weeks, is now returning to a stricter 6pm-6am duration for the whole of New Caledonia, specifically concerning the September 21-24 period (a long weekend).
Additional measures include a ban on all public meetings within Nouméa and its outskirts.
Firearms, alcohol banned
Possession, transportation and sale of firearms, ammunition and alcohol also remain prohibited until September 24.
Fuel distribution and transportation is subject to restrictions, the French High Commission said in a release on Friday.
High Commissioner Louis Le Franc told local media that the measures were taken due to the current circumstances and the appearance of some posts seen on social media which “call on public order disturbances on 24 September 2024”.
“Under those circumstances, a ban on circulation…is a measure that can efficiently prevent disruption of public order,” he said.
The restrictions, however, do not apply to persons who can provide evidence that they need to move within the prohibited hours for professional, medical emergency, domestic or international air and sea travel reasons.
Meanwhile, a bipartisan delegation from New Caledonia is scheduled to travel to Paris next week to meet high officials, including the presidents of both Houses of Parliament, French media has reported.
New Caledonia’s delegation is scheduled to travel from September 23 to October 4.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), the largest coalition in Palestinian society leading the global BDS movement, has called for immediate pressure on all states to support the updated resolution tabled at the UN General Assembly calling for sanctions on Israel.
The resolution is aimed at enacting the July 2024 Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) about the illegality of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory and its violation of the prohibition of apartheid under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).
This resolution, a diluted version of an earlier draft, falls below the bare minimum of the legal obligations of states to implement the ICJ ruling, undoubtedly a result of intense bullying and intimidation by the colonial West — led by the US and Israel’s partners in the ongoing Gaza genocide against 2.3 million Palestinians.
By relegating ending the Gaza genocide to an afterthought, the resolution ignores its utmost urgency.
Despite such obvious failure, the resolution does call for:
Ending Israel’s illegal occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, within 12 months;
Ending states’ complicity in aiding or maintaining this occupation by imposing trade and military sanctions such as “ceasing the importation of any products originating in the Israeli settlements, as well as the provision or transfer of arms, munitions and related equipment” to Israel. In April 2024, the UN Human Rights Council called for an embargo on “the sale, transfer and diversion of arms, munitions and other military equipment to Israel, the occupying Power;”
Preventing, prohibiting and eradicating Israel’s violations of article 3 of CERD identified in the advisory opinion, regarding apartheid;
Imposing sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against individuals and entities engaged in the maintenance of Israel’s unlawful occupation.
Step in right direction
Limited in scope to addressing a mere subset of Palestinian rights, the resolution does not, indeed cannot, legally or morally prejudice the other rights of the Indigenous people of Palestine, particularly the right of our refugees since the 1948 Nakba to return and receive reparations and the right of the Palestinian people, including those who are citizens of apartheid Israel, to liberation from settler-colonialism and apartheid.
Supporting this resolution would therefore be only a step in the right direction. It cannot absolve states of their legal and moral obligations to end all complicity with Israel’s regime of oppression.
Meaningful targeted sanctions by states and inter-state groups (Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, Arab League, African Union etc.) remain absolutely necessary to stop Israel’s genocide and end its occupation and apartheid.
Failing to do so would further shatter international law’s credibility and relevance to the global majority.
Dozens of UN human rights experts have confirmed that the ICJ ruling “has finally reaffirmed a principle that seemed unclear, even to the United Nations: Freedom from foreign military occupation, racial segregation and apartheid is absolutely non-negotiable”.
The ruling in effect affirms that BDS is not just a right but also “an obligation,” and it constitutes a paradigm shift from one centered on “negotiations” between oppressor and oppressed to one centered on accountability, sanctions and enforcement to end the system of oppression and to uphold the inalienable, internationally recognised rights of the Palestinian people.
States must be pressured
To sincerely implement the ICJ ruling on the occupation and fulfil the legal obligations triggered by the court’s earlier finding that Israel is plausibly perpetrating genocide in Gaza, and in line with the demands by UN human rights experts, all states must be pressured to immediately:
Impose a comprehensive arms embargo on Israel, including the export, import, shipping and transit of military and dual-use items, military cooperation, and academic and industrial research;
Impose sanctions on trade, finance, travel, technology and cooperation with Israel;
“Review all diplomatic, political, and economic ties with Israel, inclusive of business and finance, pension funds, academia and charities,” as stated by UN experts, to ensure an end to all complicity in Israel’s illegal occupation;
Impose an embargo on oil, coal and other energy exports to Israel;
Declare support for suspending apartheid Israel’s membership in the UN, as apartheid South Africa was suspended;
The Palestinian BDS National Committee (BNC), the largest coalition in Palestinian society leading the global BDS movement, has called for immediate pressure on all states to support the updated resolution tabled at the UN General Assembly calling for sanctions on Israel.
The resolution is aimed at enacting the July 2024 Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) about the illegality of Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territory and its violation of the prohibition of apartheid under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD).
This resolution, a diluted version of an earlier draft, falls below the bare minimum of the legal obligations of states to implement the ICJ ruling, undoubtedly a result of intense bullying and intimidation by the colonial West — led by the US and Israel’s partners in the ongoing Gaza genocide against 2.3 million Palestinians.
By relegating ending the Gaza genocide to an afterthought, the resolution ignores its utmost urgency.
Despite such obvious failure, the resolution does call for:
Ending Israel’s illegal occupation of Gaza and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, within 12 months;
Ending states’ complicity in aiding or maintaining this occupation by imposing trade and military sanctions such as “ceasing the importation of any products originating in the Israeli settlements, as well as the provision or transfer of arms, munitions and related equipment” to Israel. In April 2024, the UN Human Rights Council called for an embargo on “the sale, transfer and diversion of arms, munitions and other military equipment to Israel, the occupying Power;”
Preventing, prohibiting and eradicating Israel’s violations of article 3 of CERD identified in the advisory opinion, regarding apartheid;
Imposing sanctions, including travel bans and asset freezes, against individuals and entities engaged in the maintenance of Israel’s unlawful occupation.
Step in right direction
Limited in scope to addressing a mere subset of Palestinian rights, the resolution does not, indeed cannot, legally or morally prejudice the other rights of the Indigenous people of Palestine, particularly the right of our refugees since the 1948 Nakba to return and receive reparations and the right of the Palestinian people, including those who are citizens of apartheid Israel, to liberation from settler-colonialism and apartheid.
Supporting this resolution would therefore be only a step in the right direction. It cannot absolve states of their legal and moral obligations to end all complicity with Israel’s regime of oppression.
Meaningful targeted sanctions by states and inter-state groups (Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, Arab League, African Union etc.) remain absolutely necessary to stop Israel’s genocide and end its occupation and apartheid.
Failing to do so would further shatter international law’s credibility and relevance to the global majority.
Dozens of UN human rights experts have confirmed that the ICJ ruling “has finally reaffirmed a principle that seemed unclear, even to the United Nations: Freedom from foreign military occupation, racial segregation and apartheid is absolutely non-negotiable”.
The ruling in effect affirms that BDS is not just a right but also “an obligation,” and it constitutes a paradigm shift from one centered on “negotiations” between oppressor and oppressed to one centered on accountability, sanctions and enforcement to end the system of oppression and to uphold the inalienable, internationally recognised rights of the Palestinian people.
States must be pressured
To sincerely implement the ICJ ruling on the occupation and fulfil the legal obligations triggered by the court’s earlier finding that Israel is plausibly perpetrating genocide in Gaza, and in line with the demands by UN human rights experts, all states must be pressured to immediately:
Impose a comprehensive arms embargo on Israel, including the export, import, shipping and transit of military and dual-use items, military cooperation, and academic and industrial research;
Impose sanctions on trade, finance, travel, technology and cooperation with Israel;
“Review all diplomatic, political, and economic ties with Israel, inclusive of business and finance, pension funds, academia and charities,” as stated by UN experts, to ensure an end to all complicity in Israel’s illegal occupation;
Impose an embargo on oil, coal and other energy exports to Israel;
Declare support for suspending apartheid Israel’s membership in the UN, as apartheid South Africa was suspended;
A new poll shows a significant number of New Zealanders support recognising Palestine as a state and applying sanctions against Israel.
Commissioned by advocacy group Justice for Palestine and conducted by Talbot-Mills, the poll found support for recognising Palestinian statehood and sanctions for Israel was higher among young people.
It also showed many people were not sure where they stood.
While Israel’s embassy questioned the neutrality of the poll, the Minister of Foreign Affairs said it was a matter of “when, not if” for Palestinian statehood — but the main priority for now was a ceasefire.
The poll found 40 percent of the 1116 people surveyed supported recognising Palestine as a state, while 19 percent did not.
Forty-two percent of the respondents supported sanctioning Israel, while 29 percent did not.
Laura Agel, a Palestinian-British woman and a member of Justice for Palestine — the group which commissioned the poll — said it sent a clear message to the government.
“I think that the government needs to respond to the needs of its citizens, and the wants of its citizens and sanction Israel fully. I think we can see that other countries, whether small or big have taken strong action against Israel,” she said.
Many respondents without opinion
Although the poll showed strong support for Palestine, many respondents did not give an opinion either way.
Forty-one percent were not sure whether New Zealand should recognise Palestine as a state, and 30 percent were not sure whether the government should sanction Israel.
Agel put this down to the issues New Zealanders were facing in their day-to-day lives, and a lack of knowledge.
“Issues such as the cost-of-living crisis, and I think it also shows that the Israel-Palestine issue is one that people don’t necessarily think they’re very informed about,” she said.
She also blamed the government and media for not showing the extent of what was happening in Gaza.
“What they’ve done to civilians and infrastructure in Gaza. What they’ve done bombing hospitals and schools since October 7th. But also within a context of decades-long oppression.”
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters . . . immediate focus should be on a ceasefire and the provision of aid in Gaza. Image: RNZ/Samuel Rillstone
Long-standing conflict Israel and Hamas have been locked in a number of battles since 2008 — with people on both sides being killed.
About 1139 people were killed and about 240 hostages were taken. Some were freed, some died and about 97 were still unaccounted for.
More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
The military campaign also led to what the United Nations said was a “massive human rights crisis and a humanitarian disaster”.
Israeli embassy responds Israel’s embassy in Wellington told RNZ Checkpoint in a statement that Israel was defending its citizens from Hamas, and the focus should remain on “dismantling terrorism” and releasing the remaining hostages.
It added that while polls could be informative, those commissioned by advocacy groups would not always provide a comprehensive or neutral view.
It said the poll’s respondents might not be familiar with the complex roots of the Middle East conflict and the positions of all parties involved, and a question should have been added to reflect that.
Marilyn Garson, co-founder of Alternative Jewish Voices of Aotearoa, said the poll’s result that 51 percent of New Zealanders under the age of 30 supported recognising Palestinian statehood reflected a growing movement of young people rejecting Zionism — the ideology that supported the creation of a Jewish state.
That was playing out in New Zealand and overseas, she said.
“An unprecedented number of Jews are taking part in demonstrations, joining organisations for justice — for dignified solutions. And they are disproportionately young people. I think that’s magnificent.”
Garson did not care whether the solution to the crisis involved two states or 12, she said, as long both Palestinian and Jewish people were involved in the process.
“I don’t care what the number of administrative entities is, I just want to know that two peoples sat down and made a dignified choice that represent their peoples. I’ll support any outcome.”
Minister of Foreign Affairs responds In May this year, Spain, Ireland and Norway officially recognised a Palestinian state — 146 of the 193 UN members (more than 75 percent) have now recognised Palestine as a sovereign state.
A spokesperson for Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said the government had supported the establishment of a Palestinian state for decades and it was a matter of “when not if”.
But asserting Palestinian statehood at this point would not alleviate the plight of the Palestinian people, he said. The immediate focus should be on a ceasefire and the provision of aid in Gaza.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Of the 193 UN member states, 146 recognise Palestine as a sovereign state. Graphic: The Palestine Project
A South African company is reported to be the most probable bidder for shares in New Caledonia’s Prony Resources.
As part of an already advanced takeover of the ailing southern plant of Prony Resources, the most probable bidder is reported to be South African group Sibaneye-Stillwater, local new media report.
Just like the other two major mining plants and smelters in New Caledonia, Prony Resources is facing acute hardships due to the emergence of Indonesia as a major player on the world market, compounded with New Caledonia’s violent unrest that broke out in May.
The Johannesburg-based entity is a significant player on the minerals world market (including nickel, platinum and palladium) and owns, amongst other assets, a hydro-metallurgic processing plant in Sandouville (near Le Havre, western France) with a production capacity of 12,000 tonnes per year of high-grade nickel which it bought in February 2022 from French mining giant Eramet for 85 million euros (NZ$153 million).
Sibanye-Stillwater appears to follow a well-planned scheme, aiming at building an integrated project that would control all of the nickel extraction and production stages.
The ultimate goal would be, for the South African player, to become a leader on the production market for innovative electric vehicles batteries, especially on the European market.
Southern Province President Sonia Backès had already hinted last week that one buyer had now been found and that one bidder had successfully reached advanced stages in the due diligence process.
If the deal eventuated, the new entity would take over the shares held by Swiss trader Trafigura (19 percent) and another block of shares held by the Southern Province to reach a total of 74 percent participation in Prony Resources stock, as part of a major restructuration of the company’s capital.
Prony Resources, in full operation mode, employs about 1300 staff.
Another 1700 are employed indirectly through sub-contractors.
It has paused its production to retain only up to 300 staff, in safety and maintenance mode, partly due to New Caledonia’s current unrest.
New Caledonia’s Koniambo (KNS) mining site aerial view. Image: KNS
The plant’s furnaces were placed in “cold care and maintenance” mode at the end of August, six months after major shareholder Anglo-Swiss Glencore announced it wanted to withdraw and sell the 49 percent shares it has in the project.
This caused close to 1200 job losses and further 600 among sub-contractors.
Other bidders still interested
KNS claimed at least three foreign investors were still interested at this stage, but none of these have so far materialised.
Talks were however reported to continue behind the scenes, with interested parties even ready to travel and visit on-site, KNS Vice-President and spokesman Alexandre Rousseau told Reuters news agency earlier this month.
‘Okelani Group One’ But a so-called “Okelani Group One” (OGO), made up of three local partners, said their offer could revive the project with a different business model.
They say they have made an offer to KNS’s majority shareholder SMSP (Société Minière du Sud Pacifique, New Caledonia’s Northern province financial arm).
OGO president Florent Tavernier told public broadcaster NC la 1ère much depended on what Glencore intended to do with the staggering debt of some US$13.7 billion which KNS had accumulated over the past 10 years.
Another OGO partner, Gilles Hernandez, explained: “We would be targeting a niche market of very high quality nickel used in aeronautics and edge-cutting technologies, especially in Europe, where nickel is now classified as ‘strategic metal’.”
Although KNS was designed to produce 60,000 tonnes of nickel a year, that target was never reached.
OGO said it would only aim for 15,000 tonnes per year and would only re-employ 400 of the 1200 laid-off staff.
New Caledonia’s third nickel plant, owned by historic Société Le Nickel (SLN, a subsidiary of French mining giant Eramet), which is also facing major hardships for the same reasons, is said to currently operate at minimal capacity.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Vietnam’s famous Củ Chi tunnel network was on our bucket list for years.
For me, it was for more than half a century, ever since I had been editor of the Melbourne Sunday Observer, which campaigned against Australian (and New Zealand) involvement in the unjust Vietnam War — redubbed the “American War” by the Vietnamese.
For Del, it was a dream to see how the resistance of a small and poor country could defeat the might of colonisers.
“I wanted to see for myself how the tunnels and the sacrifices of the Vietnamese had contributed to winning the war,” she recalls.
“Love for country, a longing for peace and a resistance to foreign domination were strong factors in victory.”
We finally got our wish last month — a half day trip to the tunnel network, which stretched some 250 kilometres at the peak of their use. The museum park is just 45 km northeast of Ho Chi Minh city, known as Saigon during the war years (many locals still call it that).
Building of the tunnels started after the Second World War after the Japanese had withdrawn from Indochina and liberation struggles had begun against the French. But they reached their most dramatic use in the war against the Americans, especially during the spate of surprise attacks during the Tet Offensive in 1968.
Checking out the Củ Chi tunnel network near Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City. Image: David Robie/APR
The Viet Minh kicked off the network, when it was a sort of southern gateway to the Ho Chi Minh trail in the 1940s as the communist forces edged closer to Saigon. Eventually the liberation successes of the Viet Minh led to humiliating defeat of the French colonial forces at Dien Bien Phu in 1954.
Cutting off supply lines The French had rebuilt an ex-Japanese airbase in a remote valley near the Laotian border in a so-called “hedgehog” operation — in a belief that the Viet Minh forces did not have anti-aircraft artillery. They hoped to cut off the Viet Minh’s guerrilla forces’ supply lines and draw them into a decisive conventional battle where superior French firepower would prevail.
However, they were the ones who were cut off.
The Củ Chi tunnels explored. Video: History channel
The French military command badly miscalculated as General Nguyen Giap’s forces secretly and patiently hauled artillery through the jungle-clad hills over months and established strategic batteries with tunnels for the guns to be hauled back under cover after firing several salvos.
Giap compared Dien Bien Phu to a “rice bowl” with the Viet Minh on the edges and the French at the bottom.
After a 54-day siege between 13 March and 7 May 1954, as the French forces became increasingly surrounded and with casualties mounting (up to 2300 killed), the fortifications were over-run and the surviving soldiers surrendered.
The defeat led to global shock that an anti-colonial guerrilla army had defeated a major European power.
The French government of Prime Minister Joseph Laniel resigned and the 1954 Geneva Accords were signed with France pulling out all its forces in the whole of Indochina, although Vietnam was temporarily divided in half at the 17th Parallel — the communist Democratic Republic of Vietnam under Ho Chi Minh, and the republican State of Vietnam nominally under Emperor Bao Dai (but in reality led by a series of dictators with US support).
Debacle of Dien Bien Phu
The debacle of Dien Bien Phu is told very well in an exhibition that takes up an entire wing of the Vietnam War Remnants Museum (it was originally named the “Museum of American War Crimes”).
But that isn’t all at the impressive museum, the history of the horrendous US misadventure is told in gruesome detail – with some 58,000 American troops killed and the death of an estimated up to 3 million Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. (Not to mention the 521 Australian and 37 New Zealand soldiers, and the many other allied casualties.)
The section of the museum devoted to the Agent Orange defoliant war waged on the Vietnamese and the country’s environment is particularly chilling – casualties and people suffering from the aftermath of the poisoning are now into the fourth generation.
“Peace in Vietnam” posters and photographs at the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City. Image: David Robie/APR“Nixon out of Vietnam” daubed on a bombed house in the War Remnants Museum. Image: Del Abcede/APR
The global anti-Vietnam War peace protests are also honoured at the museum and one section of the compound has a recreation of the prisons holding Viet Cong independence fighters, including the torture “tiger cells”.
A shackled Viet Cong suspect (mannequin) in a torture “tiger cage” recreation. Image: David Robie/APR
A guillotine is on display. The execution method was used by both France and the US-backed South Vietnam regimes against pro-independence fighters.
A guillotine on display at the Remnants War Museum in Ho Chi Minh City. Image: David Robie/APR
A placard says: “During the US war against Vietnam, the guillotine was transported to all of the provinces in South Vietnam to decapitate the Vietnam patriots. [On 12 March 1960], the last man who was executed by guillotine was Hoang Le Kha.”
A member of the ant-French liberation “scout movement”, Hoang was sentenced to death by a military court set up by the US-backed President Ngo Dinh Diem’s regime.
Museum visit essential
Visiting Ho Ch Min City’s War Remnants Museum is essential for background and contextual understanding of the role and importance of the Củ Chi tunnels.
The Sunday Observer coverage of the My Lai massacre. Image: Screenshot David Robie/APR
Ironically, we were prosecuted for “obscenity’ for publishing photographs of a real life US obscenity and war crime in the Australian state of Victoria. (The case was later dropped).
So our trip to the Củ Chi tunnels was laced with expectation. What would we see? What would we feel?
A tunnel entrance at Ben Dinh. Image: David Robie/APR
The tunnels played a critical role in the “American” War, eventually leading to the collapse of South Vietnamese resistance in Saigon. And the guides talk about the experience and the sacrifice of Viet Cong fighters in reverential tones.
The tunnel network at Ben Dinh is in a vast park-like setting with restored sections, including underground kitchen (with smoke outlets directed through simulated ant hills), medical centre, and armaments workshop.
ingenious bamboo and metal spike booby traps, snakes and scorpions were among the obstacles to US forces pursuing resistance fighters. Special units — called “tunnel rats” using smaller soldiers were eventually trained to combat the Củ Chi system but were not very effective.
We were treated to cooked cassava, a staple for the fighters underground.
A disabled US tank demonstrates how typical hit-and-run attacks by the Viet Cong fighters would cripple their treads and then they would be attacked through their manholes.
‘Walk’ through showdown
When it came to the section where we could walk through the tunnels ourselves, our guide said: “It only takes a couple of minutes.”
It was actually closer to 10 minutes, it seemed, and I actually got stuck momentarily when my knees turned to jelly with the crouch posture that I needed to use for my height. I had to crawl on hands and knees the rest of the way.
David at a tunnel entrance — “my knees turned to jelly” but crawling through was the solution in the end. Image: David Robie/APR
A warning sign said don’t go if you’re aged over 70 (I am 79), have heart issues (I do, with arteries), or are claustrophobic (I’m not). I went anyway.
People who have done this are mostly very positive about the experience and praise the tourist tunnels set-up. Many travel agencies run guided trips to the tunnels.
How small can we squeeze to fit in the tunnel? The thinnest person in one group visiting the tunnels tries to shrink into the space. Image: David Robie/APRA so-called “clipping armpit” Viet Cong trap in the Củ Chi tunnel network. Image: David Robie/APR
“Exploring the Củ Chi tunnels near Saigon was a fascinating and historically significant experience,” wrote one recent visitor on a social media link.
“The intricate network of tunnels, used during the Vietnam War, provided valuable insights into the resilience and ingenuity of the Vietnamese people. Crawling through the tunnels, visiting hidden bunkers, and learning about guerrilla warfare tactics were eye-opening . . .
“It’s a place where history comes to life, and it’s a must-visit for anyone interested in Vietnam’s wartime history and the remarkable engineering of the Củ Chi tunnels.”
“The visit gives a very real sense of what the war was like from the Vietnamese side — their tunnels and how they lived and efforts to fight the Americans,” wrote another visitor. “Very realistic experience, especially if you venture into the tunnels.”
Overall, it was a powerful experience and a reminder that no matter how immensely strong a country might be politically and militarily, if grassroots people are determined enough for freedom and justice they will triumph in the end.
Under Pope Francis’ leadership, many church traditions have been renewed. For example, he gives space to women to take some important leadership and managerial roles in Vatican.
Many believe that the movement of the smiling Pope in distributing roles to women and lay groups is a timely move. Besides, during his term as the head of the Vatican state, the Pope has changed the Vatican’s banking and financial system.
Now, it is more transparent and accountable.
Besides, the Holy Father bluntly acknowledges the darkness concealed by the church hierarchy for years and graciously apologises for the wrong committed by the church.
The Pope invites the clergy (shepherds) to live simply, mingling and uniting with the members of the congregation (sheep).
The former archbishop of Buenos Aires also encourages the church to open itself to accepting congregations who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT).
However, Papa Francis’ encouragement was flooded with protests from some members of the church. And it is still an ongoing spiritual battle that has not been fully delivered in Catholic Church.
Two encyclicals Pope Francis, the successor of Apostle Peter, is a humble and modest man. Under his papacy, the highest authority of the Catholic Church has issued four apostolic works, two in the form of encyclicals, namely Lumen Fidei (Light of Faith) and Laudato si’ (Praise Be to You) and two others in the form of apostolic exhortations, namely Evangelii Gaudium (Joy of the Gospel) and Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love).
Of the four masterpieces of the Pope, the encyclical Laudato si’ seems to gain most attention globally.
The encyclical Laudato si’ is an invitation from the Holy Father to human beings to be responsible for the existence of the universe. He begs us human beings not to exploit and torture Mother Nature.
We should respect nature because it provides plants and cares for us like a mother does for her children. Therefore, caring for the environment or the universe is a calling that needs to be responded to genuinely.
This apostolic call is timely because the world is experiencing various threats of natural devastation that leads to natural disasters.
The irresponsible and greedy behaviour of human beings has destroyed the beauty and diversity of the flora and fauna. Other parts of the world have experienced and are experiencing adverse impacts.
This is also taking place in the Pacific region.
Sinking cities The World Economy Forum (2019) reports that it is estimated there will be eleven cities in the world that will “sink” by 2100. The cities listed include Jakarta (Indonesia), Lagos (Nigeria), Houston (Texas-US), Dhaka (Bangladesh), Virginia Beach (Virginia-US), Bangkok (Thailand), New Orleans (Louisiana-US), Rotterdam (Netherlands), Alexandra (Egypt), and Miami (Florida-US).
During the visit of the 266th Pope, he addressed the importance of securing and protecting our envirinment.
During the historic interfaith dialogue held at the Jakarta’s Istiqlal Mosque on September 5, the 87-year-old Pope said Indonesia was blessed with rainforest and rich in natural resources.
He indirectly referred to the Land of Papua — internationally known as West Papua. The message was not only addressed to the government of Indonesia, but also to Papua New Guinea.
The apostolic visit amazed people in Indonesia which is predominantly a Muslim nation. The humbleness and friendliness of Papa Francis touched the hearts of many, not only Christians, but also people with other religious backgrounds.
Witnessing the presence of the Pope in Jakarta firsthand, we could certainly testify that his presence has brought tremendous joy and will be remembered forever. Those who experienced joy were not only because of the direct encounter.
Some were inspired when watching the broadcast on the mainstream or social media.
The Pope humbly made himself available to be greeted by his people and blessed those who approached him. Those who received the greeting from the Holy Father also came from different age groups — starting from babies in the womb, toddlers and teenagers, young people, adults, the elderly and brothers and sisters with disabilities.
Pope brings inner comfort
An unforgettable experience of faith that the people of the four nations did not expect, but experienced, was that the presence of the Pope Francis brought inner comfort. It was tremendously significant given the social conditions of Indonesia, PNG and Timor-Leste are troubled politically and psychologically.
State policies that do not lift the people out of poverty, practices of injustice that are still rampant, corruption that seems endemic and systemic, the seizure of indigenous people’s customary land by giant companies with government permission, and an economic system that brings profits to a handful of people are some of the factors that have caused disturbed the inner peace of the people.
In Indonesia, soon after the inauguration on October 20 of the elected President and Vice-President, Prabowo Subianto and Gibran Rakabuming Raka, the people of Indonesia will welcome the election of governors and deputy governors, regents and deputy regents, mayors and deputy mayors.
This will include the six provinces in the Land of Papua. The simultaneous regional elections will be held on November 27.
The public will monitor the process of the regional election. Reflecting on the presidential election which allegedly involved the current President’s “interference”, in the collective memory of democracy lovers there is a possibility of interference from the government that will lead the nation.
Could that happen? Only time will tell. The task of all elements of society is to jointly maintain the values of honest, honest and open democracy.
Pope Francis in his book, Let Us Dream, the Path to the Future (2020) wrote:
“We need a politics that can integrate and dialogue with the poor, the excluded, and the vulnerable that gives people a say in the decisions that impact their lives.”
Hope for people’s struggles
This message of Pope Francis has a deep meaning in the current context. What is common everywhere, politicians only make sweet promises or give fake hope to voters so that they are elected.
After being elected, the winning or elected candidate tends to be far from the people.
Therefore, a fragment of the Holy Father’s invitation in the book needs to be a shared concern. The written and implied meaning of the fragment above is not far from the democratic values adopted by Indonesia and other Pacific nations.
Pacific Islanders highly value the views of each person. But lately the noble values that were well-cultivated and inherited by the ancestors are increasingly diminishing.
Hopefully, the governments will deliver on the real needs and struggles of the people.
“Our greatest power is not in the respect that others have for us, but the service we can give others,” wrote Pope Francis.
Laurens Ikinia is a lecturer and researcher at the Institute of Pacific Studies, Indonesian Christian University, Jakarta, and is a member of the Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN).
The landmark ruling sank without trace in Aotearoa New Zealand and aside from an anaemic tweet from the Minister of Foreign Affairs has barely caused a ripple in official circles.
However, the court’s July 19 decision is a watershed in holding Israel to account for its numerous breaches of international law and United Nations resolutions and while western governments prefer to look the other way, this is no longer tenable.
The ICJ has found not only that Israel’s 57-year occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem is illegal but that BDS (Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions) are an obligation on governments to impose on Israel.
The wording is unambiguous. The ICJ says:
“The State of Israel’s continued presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory is unlawful [and it] is under an obligation to bring to an end its unlawful presence . . . as rapidly as possible.”
And goes on to say:
“All States are under an obligation not to recognise as legal the situation arising from the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the [Occupied Palestinian Territory] and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by the continued presence of the State of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
NZ government must reevaluate
Not rendering “aid or assistance” to Israel to continue its illegal occupation means the New Zealand government must re-evaluate its entire relationship with Israel.
For a start government investments in companies profiting from Israel’s illegal occupation must be withdrawn; imports or procurement of services from companies in the illegally-occupied Palestinian territories must be stopped and visas for young Israelis coming to New Zealand after serving in support of Israel’s illegal occupation must cease.
A host of other government policies to impose BDS sanctions against Israel must follow — the type of sanctions we imposed against Russia for its invasion and occupation of parts of Ukraine.
This ICJ ruling comes as western governments such as New Zealand shamefully provide political cover for Israel’s illegal occupation and wholesale slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza. Most of the victims are women and children.
By April Israel had dropped over 70,000 tonnes of bombs on Gaza, surpassing the bombing of Dresden, Hamburg, and London combined during World War II, in one of the most densely populated areas in the world.
Israel has killed the equivalent of all the children in more than 100 average sized New Zealand primary schools and yet our Prime Minister has refused to condemn this slaughter, refused to call for an immediate, permanent ceasefire or join South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.
Our Prime Minister describes the situation in Gaza as catastrophic but refuses to utter a single word of condemnation of Israel. Mr Luxon has replaced principled political action with bluff and bluster.
Widening chasm with international law
The gap between what our government does and what international law demands is a widening chasm.
Gaza exists as an illegally occupied and densely populated area because Israeli militias conducted a massive ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from 1947 to 1949 to artificially create a majority Jewish state on Palestinian land.
Eighty percent of Gazans are descendants of the victims of this ethnic cleansing.
Under cover of its war on Gaza, Israel’s ethnic cleansing continues today in the occupied West Bank. Illegal Israeli settlers, with the backing of Israeli Occupation Forces are driving Palestinians off their land.
Numerous Palestinian towns and rural communities have been attacked in pogroms with arson, looting and killing leaving “depopulated” areas behind for Israel to settle.
There are now more than 700,000 illegal Israeli settlers in more than 200 settlements and settlement outposts on Palestinian land in the occupied territories of East Jerusalem and the West Bank.
700,000 settlers declared illegal
It is these settlers and settlements the International Court of Justice has declared illegal.
As well as responsibilities on individual states to end support for Israel’s illegal occupation, the ICJ ruling says the world should take collective action requesting “The UN, and especially the General Assembly . . . and the Security Council, should consider the precise modalities and further action required to bring to an end as rapidly as possible the unlawful presence of the State of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
New Zealand must regain its moral courage and become a leader in helping end the longest-running military occupation in modern history.
John Minto is national chair of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA). This article was first published by The Daily Blog and is republished by Asia Pacific Report with the author’s permission.
SPECIAL REPORT:By Te Aniwaniwa Paterson of Te Ao Māori News
West Papuan independence advocate Octo Mote is in Aotearoa New Zealand to win support for independence for West Papua, which has been ruled by Indonesia for more than 60 years.
Mote is vice-president of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) and is being hosted in New Zealand by the Green Party, which Mote said had always been a “hero” for West Papua.
ULMWP president Benny Wenda has alleged more than 500,000 Papuans have been killed since the occupation, and millions of hectares of ancestral forests, rivers and mountains have been destroyed or polluted for “corporate profit”.
The struggle for West Papuans “Being born a West Papuan, you are already an enemy of the nation [Indonesia],” Mote says.
“The greatest challenge we are facing right now is that we are facing the colonial power who lives next to us.”
If West Papuans spoke up about what was happening, they were considered “separatists”, Mote says, regardless of whether they are journalists, intellectuals, public servants or even high-ranking Indonesian generals.
“When our students on the ground speak of justice, they’re beaten up, put in jail and [the Indonesians] kill so many of them,” Mote says.
Mote is a former journalist and says that while he was working he witnessed Indonesian forces openly fire at students who were peacefully demonstrating their rights.
“We are in a very dangerous situation right now. When our people try to defend their land, the Indonesian government ignores them and they just take the land without recognising we are landowners,” he says.
The ‘ecocide’ of West Papua The ecology in West Papua iss being damaged by mining, deforestation, and oil and gas extraction. Mote says Indonesia wants to “wipe them from the land and control their natural resources”.
He says he is trying to educate the world that defending West Papua means defending the world, especially small islands in the Pacific.
West Papua is the western half of the island of New Guinea, bordering the independent nation of Papua New Guinea. New Guinea has the world’s third-largest rainforest after the Amazon and Congo and it is crucial for climate change mitigation as they sequester and store carbon.
Mote says the continued deforestation of New Guinea, which West Papuan leaders are trying to stop, would greatly impact on the small island countries in the Pacific, which are among the most vulnerable to climate change.
Mote also says their customary council in West Papua has already considered the impacts of climate change on small island nations and, given West Papua’s abundance of land the council says that by having sovereignty they would be able to both protect the land and support Pacific Islanders who need to migrate from their home islands.
In 2021, West Papuan leaders pledged to make ecocide a serious crime and this week Vanuatu, Fiji and Samoa submitted a court proposal to the International Criminal Court (ICJ) to recognise ecocide as a crime.
Support from local Indonesians Mote says there are Indonesians who support the indigenous rights movement for West Papuans. He says there are both NGOs and a Papuan Peace Network founded by West Papuan peace campaigner Neles Tebay.
“There is a movement growing among the academics and among the well-educated people who have read the realities among those who are also victims of the capitalist investors, especially in Indonesia when they introduced the Omnibus Law.”
The so-called Omnibus Law was passed in 2020 as part of outgoing President Joko Widodo’s goals to increase investment and industrialisation in Indonesia. The law was protested against because of concerns it would be harmful for workers due to changes in working conditions, and the environment because it would allow for increased deforestation.
Mote says there has been an “awakening”, especially among the younger generations who are more open-minded and connected to the world, who could see it both as a humanitarian and an environmental issue.
The ‘transfer’ of West Papua to Indonesia “The [former colonial nation] Dutch [traded] us like a cow,” Mote says.
The former Dutch colony was passed over to Indonesia in 1963 in disputed circumstances but the ULMWP calls it an “invasion”.
From 1957, the Soviet Union had been supplying arms to Indonesia and, during that period, the Indonesian Communist Party had become the largest political party in the country.
The US engineered a meeting between both countries, which resulted in the New York Agreement, giving control of West Papua to the UN in 1962 and then Indonesia a year later.
The New York Agreement stipulated that the population of West Papua would be entitled to an act of self-determination.
The ‘act of no choice’ This decolonisation agreement was titled the 1969 Act of Free Choice, which is referred to as “the act of no choice” by pro-independence activists.
Mote says they witnessed “how the UN allowed Indonesia to cut us into pieces, and they didn’t say anything when Indonesia manipulated our right to self-determination”.
The manipulation Mote refers to is for the Act of Free Choice. Instead of a national referendum, the Indonesian military hand-picked 1025 West Papuan “representatives” to vote on behalf of the 816,000 people. The representatives were allegedly threatened, bribed and some were held at gunpoint to ensure a unanimous vote.
Leaders of the West Papuan independence movement assert that this was not a real opportunity to exercise self-determination as it was manipulated. However, it was accepted by the UN.
Pacific support at UN General Assembly Mote has came to Aotearoa after the 53rd Pacific Island Forum Leaders summit in Tonga last week and he has come to discuss plans over the next five years. Mote hopes to gain support to take what he calls the “slow-motion genocide” of West Papua back to the UN General Assembly.
“In that meeting we formulated how we can help really push self-determination as the main issue in the Pacific Islands,” Mote says.
Mote says there was a focus on self-determination of West Papua, Kanaky/New Caledonia and Tahiti. He also said the focus was on what he described as the current colonisation issue with capitalists and global powers having vested interests in the Pacific region.
The movement got it to the UN General Assembly in 2018, so Mote says it is achievable. In 2018, Pacific solidarity was shown as the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu and the Republic of Vanuatu all spoke out in support of West Papua.
They affirmed the need for the matter to be returned to the United Nations, and the Solomon Islands voiced its concerns over human rights abuses and violations.
ULMWP vice-president Octo Mote . . . in the next five years Pacific nations need to firstly make the Indonesian government “accountable” for its actions in West Papua. Image: Poster screenshot
What needs to be done He says that in the next five years Pacific nations need to firstly make the Indonesian government accountable for its actions in West Papua. He also says outgoing President Widodo should be held accountable for his “involvement”.
Mote says New Zealand is the strongest Pacific nation that would be able to push for the human rights and environmental issues happening, especially as he alleges Australia always backs Indonesian policies.
He says he is looking to New Zealand to speak up about the atrocities taking place in West Papua and is particularly looking for support from the Greens, Labour and Te Pāti Māori for political support.
The coalition government announced a plan of action on July 30 this year, which set a new goal of $6 billion in annual two-way trade with Indonesia by 2029.
“New Zealand is strongly committed to our partnership with Indonesia,” Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters said at the time.
“There is much more we can and should be doing together.”
Te Aniwaniwa Paterson is a digital producer for Te Ao Māori News. Republished by Asia Pacific Report with permission.
The Samoan government’s attempt to control the media for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting is a slap across the face of press freedom, democracy and freedom of speech.
It is a farce and an attempt by a dysfunctional government unit to gag local and overseas media.
No international forum of such importance does this. The United Nations, the Pacific Islands Forum or other CHOGMs never had to deal with such dictatorial policies for journalism. What is the sub-committee thinking?
We are not living under a dictatorship, neither are the media organisations coming to cover the event. The message to media organisations like the BBC, ABC, AFP and others is you will only publish and broadcast what we tell you to.
To the people who came up with these policies, what were you thinking? This goes to show the inexperience of the press secretariat and the media sub-committee. It would have been good if you had involved experienced journalists who have covered international events.
There is never a restriction on media to cover side events, there is never a restriction for photographers and cameramen to take pictures, and there are never restrictions for media to approach delegates for interviews or what content they can get their hands on.
In any international forum, the state or the organisation’s media uploads their content, interviews, pictures and videos and makes it accessible for all to use. It is at the discretion of the media to choose to use it. In most cases, the media come with their issues and angles. To say that this will be dictated, makes it sound like this is not Samoa but China.
Next thing, the sub-committee will announce prison terms for not following the policies set by them. The CHOGM is the biggest international event Samoa has ever hosted and this decision is going to cause an international nightmare. The media in Samoa is furious because this is choking media freedom.
The hiring of a New Zealand company will not solve the matter. They can help the government as they have done sporting bodies for the Pacific Games but who are you to dictate to the media what to publish and what to report?
Each of the heads of delegations will be followed by the media from their country including their state media. All these people will not be allowed at the closing and opening ceremony. ABC, Nine News and other Australian media will follow Anthony Albanese, RNZ, New Zealand Herald, and Stuff will be behind Christopher Luxon and the British media with the King.
This is surely not a move proposed by the Commonwealth Secretariat. If anyone at the press secretariat or any of the state-owned media has covered international events like the COP, CHOGM, UN meetings or even the Pacific Island Forum Leaders Meeting, you will know that this is not how things work. To even recommend that overseas and local media work together to cover the event is absurd.
Imagine the press secretariat journalist following Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mataafa is told at an international event, no stay away from the events she goes to because we will tell where you are allowed to go. That also begs the question, will state media from other countries be treated differently from media who are independent?
Each media outlet has its priorities. They will cover what is relevant to their audience.
Media are given access and the option to choose whichever side event they would want to be part of. Does this also mean that the itinerary or schedule of events will also be not made public?
The prime minister needs to intervene as quickly as possible before this situation escalates into an international incident. Stifling the media is never a good thing and trying to control them is even worse. Let us hope that this is not the legacy of this government. The one that managed to control media from 54 countries. It would be an achievement marked on the international stage.
This year, Samoa jumped into the top 20 in the latest press freedom index released by the global group Reporters Without Borders out of 180 countries and territories assessed.
It is one of only two Pacific nations in the top 20 of the index with New Zealand the other state and ahead of Samoa in 13th position. The other Pacific states below Aotearoa and Samoa include Australia (27), Tonga (44), Papua New Guinea (59), and Fiji (89).
This is not a reflection of that.
To justify this action by saying it is being done for security reasons either shows that you expect journalists to kill delegates with their questions or the lack of security arrangements surrounding the event. Is this an attempt to hide the inadequacies of the preparation from the eyes of the world?
The sub-committee even said this was done to safeguard information that cannot be released. If you have covered an event like this before, you would know how it works. The least you could have done was consult with the Commonwealth media team or Rwanda, the previous hosts. The media know which meetings are public.
The CHOGM is not a private event. It concerns governments from 54 nations and a government is its people. Do not be responsible for breaking the communication between governments and their people. Do not be the people to go down in history as the ones who killed media freedom at CHOGM, because that is what has happened here.
If this is allowed to happen for CHOGM, a dangerous precedence will be set for future local events.
The Samoa Observer editorial on 12 September 2024. Republished with permission.
Two open letters on the genocidal Israeli war against Palestinian sent to The Press for publication that have been ignored in the continued Aotearoa New Zealand media silence over 11 months of atrocities.
Both letters have been sent to the Christchurch morning daily newspaper by the co-presenter of the Plains FM radio programme Earthwise, Lois Griffiths.
The first letter, had been “sent . . . in time for it to be published on 29 August 2024. the anniversary of the Palestinian political cartoonist Naji al-Ali‘s murder”, Griffiths said.
A protest boat aimed at breaking the illegal Israeli siege of Gaza, Handala, is named after a cartoon boy created by the cartoonist.
On board the Handala, currently in the Mediterranean ready to break the siege with humanitarian aid for the Palestinians, are two New Zealand-Palestinian crew, Rana Hamida and Youssef Sammour.
Yet even this fact doesn’t make the letter newsworthy enough for publication.
Griffiths sent Naji al-Ali’s cartoon figure Handala with the letter to The Press. The open letter:
Dear Editor,
The situation in Gaza is so very very disturbing . . . those poor people . . . those poor men, women and CHILDREN.
How many readers are aware that 2 New Zealanders are on a boat that hopes to take aid to Gaza. Maybe the brave actions of those 2 Kiwis, joined by other international volunteers, of trying to break the siege of Gaza, will rally the rest of the world to finally stop looking away.
Handala, the cartoon character . . . a symbol of Palestinian resistance. Image: Naji al-Ali
They are on a very special boat, a boat with a name chosen to fit the occasion, the Handala.
Handala is the name chosen by the Palestinian political cartoonist Naji al-Ali, for a cartoon refugee boy who stands with his back to the reader, in the corner of his political cartoons.
Handala witnesses the suffering inflicted on his people.
We have a book of al-Ali’s drawings, A Child in Palestine.
Naji al-Ali was well-loved by the Palestinians for using his skills to share, with the world, stories of what the people had to endure.
On 29 August 1987, the cartoonist died after being shot in London by an unknown assailant.
Yet the memory of Naji al-Ali survives.
The memory of Handala survives. He represents the Palestinian children. And the boat named Handala is sailing for the children of Gaza.
Yours Lois Griffiths
South Africa then, why not Israel now?
In the other letter sent to The Press a week ago, Lois Griffiths, in time for the opening of the UN General Assembly on September 8, she urged the New Zealand government to call for the suspension of Israel.
Not published, yet another example of New Zealand mainstream newspapers’ blind responses and hypocrisy over community views on the Gaza genocide?
Dear Editor,
Tuesday of this week, 08 September, is the date for the opening of UNGA, the UN General Assembly.
In 1974, South Africa was suspended from the UN General Assembly after being successfully charged by the ICJ, International Court of Justice, of apartheid. This move isolated South Africa and was very effective in leading to the collapse of the apartheid regime.
Now, the democratic regime of South Africa has taken a case to the ICJ [International Criminal Court] charging Israel with genocide. In an interim judgment, the ICJ has broadly supported South Africa’s case.
The situation in Gaza is so vile now: the bombing, the targeting of residences, schools and hospitals, the lack of protection from disease, the huge numbers of bodies lying under rubble. And now, violence against the Palestinians in the West Bank is on the increase.
Where is humanity? What does it mean to be human?
A step that would certainly help to slow down the genocide, would be for Israel to be suspended from the UN General Assembly.
Please New Zealand. Call for the suspension of Israel from the UNGA.
NOW!!
Yours, Lois Griffiths
Palestinian resistance artwork on the humanitarian boat Handala . . . hoping to break the Gaza blockade. Image: Screenshot PushPull
Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister James Marape has successfully thwarted a vote of no confidence after 75 MPs backed him and 32 voted for the opposition.
But the session was not without drama.
Just after 10am, after the opposition leader moved a motion for a vote of no confidence announcing Renbo Paita as the alternate prime minister, Parliament Haus descended into momentary chaos as members questioned why Speaker Job Pomat refused to allow debate after the motion.
The opposition had intended to use the opportunity to highlight pressing concerns that caused MPs to move to the opposition.
The Member for Madang, Bryan Kramer, a former minister of justice and police, challenged the Speaker to follow standing orders to the letter as stipulated in the constitution while Wabag MP Lino Tom accused the Speaker of “stifling the people’s voices” by not entertaining debate.
“The people of this country paid our salaries to debate this. The people need to know why we put in a vote of no confidence,” Tom said.
“This is the right forum where our voices need to be heard”
Speaker admits error
After intense exchanges between the chair and the opposition, the Speaker admitted to making an error in parliamentary process.
But he still proceeded to call for a vote.
PNG’s constitution allows a government a grace period of 18 months before a vote of no confidence can be brought to Parliament. Since 1977, every sitting prime minister has had to fend off threats of votes of no confidence.
James Marape himself, came to power in 2018, through a vote of no confidence.
While Prime Minister Marape may have been successful this time, he still faces the possibility of another vote of no confidence if the opposition musters enough numbers to do so.
Speaking after the vote, Marape said that while votes of no confidence were an essential part of democracy, Section 145 of the constitution, which provides for the process, had been abused in many instances.
“Provincial governors have five years to work. Provincial legislators have five years to work. The most important chair of the land has 18 months . . . and managing 18 months of politics and doing work, comes with great cost.”
The pressure is now on him to prove that that he has the ability and the political will to stem instances of corruption, fix the ailing economy, stem inflation and address crime — the biggest concerns for Papua New Guineans.
Over the next few days, the Prime Minister will announce a cabinet reshuffle to fill vacancies left by MPs who have left.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The Victorian Greens have demanded an independent inquiry into Australian police tactics and alleged excessive use of force today against antiwar protesters at the Land Forces expo in Melbourne.
State Greens leader Ellen Sandell said her party had lodged a formal protest to the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (IBAC).
“We have seen police throw flash grenades into crowds of protesters, use pepper spray indiscriminately, and whip people with horse whip,” she also said in a X post.
“These are military-style tactics used by police against protesters who are trying to have their say, as is their democratic right.”
Police used stun grenades and pepper spray and arrested 39 people as officers were pelted with rocks, manure and tomatoes in what has been described as Melbourne’s biggest police operation in two decades, reports Al Jazeera.
The Victorian Greens and I have demanded an independent inquiry into Victoria Police tactics and excessive use of force at the Land Forces protests in Melbourne today. pic.twitter.com/p8iLU073S0
The Land Forces expo protest. Image: Al Jazeera screenshot
The pro-Palestine protesters, also demanding a change in Canberra’s stance on Israel’s war in Gaza, clashed with the police outside the arms fair.
Thousands picketed the Land Forces 2024 military weapons exposition. Australia has seen numerous protests against the country’s arms industry’s involvement in the war over the past 11 months.
Protesting for ‘those killed’ in Gaza
“We’re protesting to stand up for all those who have been killed by the type of weapons [in Gaza] on display at the convention,” said Jasmine Duff from organiser Students for Palestine in a statement.
About 1800 police officers have been deployed at the Melbourne Convention Centre hosting the three-day weapons exhibition. Up to 25,000 people had previously been expected to turn up at the protest.
Two dozen people were reported as requiring medical treatment, said a Victoria state police spokesperson in a statement.
Demonstrators also lit fires in the street and disrupted traffic and public transport, while missiles were thrown at police horses.
However, no serious injuries were reported, according to police.
Deputy Greens leader backs protesters
In a speech to the Senate, the deputy federal leader of the Greens, Senator Mehreen Faruqi, offered her solidarity to “the thousands protesting in Melbourne today to say no to the business of war”.
Australian Greens Deputy Leader Senator Mehreen Faruqi . . . [Australia’s] Labor government is complicit in genocide”. Image: Al Jazeera screenshot“[The governing] Labor tries to distract and deflect, but there is no deflection. So long as we have defence contracts with Israeli weapons companies, the Labor government is complicit in genocide, so long as you refuse to impose sanctions on Israel, this Labor government is complicit in genocide, and there are no excuses for inaction,” she said.
“The UK has suspended some arms sales to Israel. Canada today is halting more arms sales to Israel.
“What will it take for [Australia’s] Labor government to take action against the apartheid state of Israel?”
Police used stun grenades and pepper spray and arrested 39 people at today’s Land Forces expo in Melbourne, Victoria. Image: V_Palestine20
With similar Israel divestment motions having been passed at City of Sydney and Canterbury/Bankstown Councils, many had expected the motion to pass in what is supposed to be one of the most progressive areas of Sydney. Wendy Bacon reports on what went wrong.
INVESTIGATION: By Wendy Bacon
Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza and the West Bank is tearing apart local councils in Australia, on top of the angst reverberating around state and federal politics.
Inner West Labor Mayor Darcy Byrne has doubled down on his attack on pro-Palestinian activists at the council’s last election meeting before Australia’s local government elections on September 14.
‘Byrne’s attack echoes an astro-turfing campaign supported by rightwing and pro-Israel groups targeting the Greens in inner city electorates.’
READ MORE: Other articles by Wendy Bacon
With Labor narrowly controlling the council by one vote, the election loomed large over the meeting. It also coincided with a campaign backed by rightwing pro-Israeli groups to eliminate Greens from several inner Sydney councils.
In August, Labor councillors voted down a motion for an audit of whether any Inner West Council (IWC) investments or contracts benefit companies involved in the weapons industry or profit from human rights violations in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
The motion that was defeated had also called for an insertion of a general “human rights” provision in council’s investment policy.
With similar motions having been passed at City of Sydney and Canterbury/Bankstown councils, many had expected the motion to pass in what is supposed to be one of the most progressive areas of Sydney.
It could have been a first step towards the Inner West Council joining the worldwide BDS (boycotts, disinvestments and economic sanctions) campaign to pressure Israel to meet its obligations under international law.
MWM sources attest that the ructions at Inner West Council are mirrored elsewhere in local government. This from Randwick in Sydney’s East:
Randwick Council: MWM source
Global to grassroots
Last week, Portland Council in Maine became the fifth United States city to join the campaign this year, while the City of Ixelles in Belgium announced that it had suspended its twinning agreement with the Regional Council of Megiddo in Israel.
When the Inner West motion failed, some Palestinian rights campaigners booed and shouted “shame” at Labor councillors as they sat silently in the chamber. The meeting, which had nearly reached its time limit of five hours, was then adjourned.
Byrne’s alternative motion was debated at last week’s meeting. It restates council’s existing policy and Federal Labor’s current stance that calls for a ceasefire and a two-state solution.
This alternative motion was passed by Labor councillors, with the Greens and two Independents voting against it. Both Independent Councillor Pauline Lockie and Greens Councillor Liz Atkins argued that they were opposing the motion because it did not do or change anything.
The Mayor spent most of his speaking time attacking those involved with protesting at the August meeting. He described their behaviour as “unacceptable, undemocratic and disrespectful”. There is no doubt that the behaviour at the meeting breached the rules of meeting behaviour at some times.
But then Byrne made a much more shocking and unexpected allegation. He said that the “worst element” of the behaviour was that “local Inner West citizens who happened to have a Jewish sounding name, when their names were read out by me because they’d registered . . . to speak, I think all of them were booed and hissed just because their names happened to sound Jewish.”
News Corp propaganda This claim is deeply disturbing. If true, such behaviour would definitely be anti-semitic and racist. But the question is: did such behaviour actually happen? Or does this allegation feed into Byrne’s misleading narrative that had fuelled false News Corporation reports that protesters stormed the meeting?
In fact, the protesters had been invited to the meeting by the Mayor.
This reporter was present throughout the meeting and did not observe anything similar to what the Mayor alleged had happened.
Later in the meeting, the Mayor repeated the allegation that the “booing and hissing of people” based “on the fact that they had a Jewish sounding name constituted anti-semitism”.
Retiring Independent Councillor Pauline Locker intervened: “Sorry, point of order, That isn’t actually what happened. . . . It wasn’t based on their Jewish name.”
But Bryne insisted, “That’s not a point of order — that is what happened. It is what the record shows occurred as does the media reportage.”
Other councillors also distanced themselves from Byrne’s allegation. Independent Councillor John Stamolis also said that although he could not judge how the Mayor or other Labor councillors felt on the evening, he could not agree with Byrne’s description or that it described what other councillors or members of the public experienced on the evening.
Greens Councillor Liz Atkins said that there were different perceptions of what happened on the night. Her perception was that the “booing and hissing” was in relation to support for the substance of the Greens motion for an audit of investments rather than an attack on people who spoke against it.
She also said that credit should be given to pro- Palestinian activists who themselves encouraged people to listen quietly.
Fake antisemitism claims Your reporter asked Rosanna Barbero, who also was present throughout the meeting, what she observed. Barbero was the recipient of this year’s Multicultural NSW Human Rights Medal, recognising her lasting and meaningful contribution to human rights in NSW.
She is also a member of the Inner West Multicultural Network that has helped council develop an anti-racism strategy.
“I did not witness any racist comments,” said Barbero.
Barbero confirmed that she was present throughout the meeting and said: “I did not witness any racist comments. The meeting was recorded so the evidence of that is easy to verify.”
So this reporter, in a story for City Hub, took her advice and went to the evidence in the webcast, which provides a public record of what occurred. The soundtrack is clear. A listener can pick up when comments are made by audience members but not necessarily the content of them.
Bryne has alleged speakers against the motion were booed when their “Jewish sounding’ names were announced. Our analysis shows none of the five were booed or abused in any way when their names were announced.
There was, in fact, silence.
Five speakers identified themselves as Jewish. Four spoke against the motion, and one in favour.
Two of the five were heard in complete silence, one with some small applause at the end.
One woman who spoke in favour of the motion and whose grandparents were in the Holocaust was applauded and cheered at the end of her speech.
One man was interrupted by several comments from the gallery when he said the motion was based on “propaganda and disinformation” and would lead to a lack of social cohesion. He related experiences of anti-semitism when he was at school in the Inner West 14 years ago.
At the conclusion of his speech, there were some boos.
One man who had not successfully registered was added to the speakers list by the Mayor. Some people in the public gallery objected to this decision. The Mayor adjourned the meeting for three minutes and the speaker was then heard in silence.
The speakers in favour of the motion, most of whom had Palestinian backgrounds and relatives who had suffered expulsion from their homelands, concentrated on the war crimes against Palestinians and the importance of BDS motions. There were no personal attacks on speakers against the motion.
In response to a Jewish speaker who had argued that the solution was peace initiatives, one Palestinian speaker said that he wanted “liberation”, not “peace”.
Weaponising accusations of anti-semitism to shut down debate Independent Inner West Councillor Pauline Lockie warned other councillors this week about the need to be careful about weaponising accusations of race and anti-semitism to shut down debates. Like Barbero, Lockie has played a leadership role in developing anti-racism strategies for the Inner West.
There are three serious concerns about Byrne’s allegations. The first concern is that they are not verified by the public record. This raises questions about the Mayor’s judgement and credibility.
The second is that making unsubstantiated allegations of antisemitism for the tactical purposes of winning a political argument demeans the seriousness and tragedy of anti-semitism.
Thirdly, there is a concern that spreading unsubstantiated allegations of anti-semitism could cause harm by spreading fear and anxiety in the Jewish community.
Controversial Christian minister The most provocative speaker on the evening was not one of those who identified themselves as Jewish. It was Reverend Mark Leach, who introduced himself as an Anglican minister from Balmain. When he said that no one could reasonably apply the word “genocide” to what was occurring in Gaza, several people called out his comments.
Given the ICJ finding that a plausible genocide is occurring in Gaza, this was not surprising.
Darcy Byrne then stopped the meeting and gave Reverend Leach a small amount of further time to speak. Later in his speech, Reverend Leach described the motion itself as “deeply racist” because it held Israel accountable above all other states.
Boos for Leach In fact, the motion would have added a general human rights provision to the investment policy which would have applied to any country. Reverend Leach was booed at the conclusion of his speech.
One speaker later said that she could not understand how this Christian minister would not accept that the word “genocide” could be used. This was not an anti-semitic or racist comment.
Throughout the debate, Byrne avoided the issue that the motion only called for an audit.
He also used his position of chair to directly question councillors. The following exchange occurred with Councillor Liz Atkins:
Mayor: Councilor Atkins, can I put to you a question? I have received advice that councillor officers are unaware of any investment from council that is complicit in the Israeli military operations in Gaza and the Palestinian territories. Are you aware of any?
Atkins: No. That’s why the motion asked for an audit of our investments and procurements.
Mayor: I’ll put one further question to you. The organisers of the protest outside the chamber and the subsequent overrunning of the council chamber asserted in their promotion of the event that the council was complicit in genocide. Is that your view?
Atkins: I don’t know. Until we do an audit, Mayor . . . Can I just take exception with the point of view that they “overran” the meeting? You invited them all in, and not one of them tried to get past a simple rope barrier.
Byrne says it’s immoral to support a one-party state During the debate, Byrne surprisingly described support for a one-state solution for Israel and Palestinians as “immoral”. He described support for “one state” as meaning you either supported the wiping out of the Palestinians or the Israelis.
In fact, there is a long history of citizens, scholars and other commentators who have argued that one secular state of equal citizens is the only viable solution.
Many, including the Australian government, do not agree. Nevertheless, the award-winning journalist and expert on the Middle East, Antony Loewenstein, argued that position in The Sydney Morning Herald in November 2023.
Mayor in tune with Better Council Inc campaign All of this debate is happening in the context of the hotly contested election campaign. The Mayor is understandably preoccupied with the impending poll. Rather than debating the issues, he finished the debate by launching an attack on the Greens, which sounded more like an election speech than a speech in reply in support of his motion.
Byrne said: “Some councillors are unwilling to condemn what was overt anti-Semitism”.
This is a heavy accusation. All councillors are strongly opposed to anti-semitism. The record does not show any overt anti-semitism.
Byrne went on: “But the more troubling thing is that there’s a large number of candidates running at this election who, if elected, will be making foreign affairs and this particular issue one of the central concerns of this council.
“This will result in a distraction with services going backwards and rates going up.”
In fact, the record shows that the Greens are just as focused on local issues as any other councillors. Even at last week’s meeting, Councillor Liz Atkins brought forward a motion about controversial moves to install a temporary cafe at Camperdown Park that would privatise public space and for which there had been no consultation.
Labor v Greens Byrne’s message pitting concern about broader issues against local concerns is in tune with the messaging of a recently formed group called Better Council Inc. that is targeting the Greens throughout the Inner West and in Randwick and Waverley.
Placards saying “Put the Greens last”, “Keep the Greens Garbage out of Council” featuring a number of Greens candidates have gone up across Sydney. Some claim that the Greens are fixated on Gaza and ignore local issues.
Better Inc.’s material is authorised by Sophie Calland. She is a recently graduated computer engineer who told the Daily Telegraph that “she was a Labor member and that Better Council involves people from across the political aisle — even some former Greens.”
She described the group as a “grassroots group of young professionals” who wanted local government officials to focus on local issues.
“We believe local councils should concentrate on essential community services like waste management, local infrastructure, and the environment. That’s what councils are there for — looking after the needs of their immediate communities.”
On Saturday, Randwick Greens Councillor Kym Chapple was at a pre-poll booth at which a Better Council Inc. campaigner was handing out material specifically recommending that voters put her last.
Chapple tweeted that the Better councilwoman didn’t actually know that she was a councillor or any of the local issues in which she had been involved.
“That does not look like a local grassroots campaign. It’s an attempt to intimidate people who support a free Palestine. Anyway, it feels gross to have someone say to put you last because they care about the environment and local issues when that’s literally what you have done for three years.”
She then tweeted a long list of her local campaign successes.
Never Again is Now astroturf campaign
In fact, the actual work of distributing the leaflets is being done by a group spearheaded by none other than Reverend Mark Leach, who spoke at the Inner West Council meeting. Leach is one of the coordinators of the pro-Israel right-wing Christian group Never Again is Now.
The group is organising rallies around Australia to campaign against anti-semitism.
Reverend Mark Leach works closely with his daughter Freya Leach, who stood for the Liberal Party for the seat of Balmain in the 2023 state election and is associated with the rightwing Menzies Institute. Mark Leach describes himself as “working to renew the mind and heart of our culture against the backdrop of the radical left, Jihadist Islam and rising authoritarianism.
Leach’s own Twitter account shows that he embraces a range of rightwing causes. He is anti-trans, supports anti-immigration campaigners in the UK and has posted a jolly video of himself with Warren Mundine at a pro-Israeli rally in Melbourne.
Mundine was a No campaign spokesperson for the rightwing group Advance Australia during the Voice referendum.
Leach supports the Christian Lobby and is very critical of Christians who are campaigning for peace.
Anti-semitism exists. The problem is that Reverend Leach’s version of anti-semitism is what international law and human rights bodies regard as protesting against genocidal war crimes.
For #NeverAgainisNow, these atrocities are excusable for a state that is pursuing its right of “self-defence”. And if you don’t agree with that, don’t be surprised if you find yourself branded as not just “anti-semitic” but also a bullying extremist.
As of one week before the local government election, the Never Again is Now was holding a Zoom meeting to organise 400 volunteers to get 50,000 leaflets into the hands of voters at next Saturday’s local election.
This may well be just a dress rehearsal for a much bigger effort at the Federal election, where Advance Australia has announced it is planning to target the Greens.
Wendy Baconis an investigative journalist who was professor of journalism at UTS. She has worked for Fairfax, Channel Nine and SBS and has published in The Guardian, New Matilda, City Hub and Overland. She has a long history in promoting independent and alternative journalism. She is not a member of any political party but is a Greens supporter and long-term supporter of peaceful BDS strategies. Republished from Michael West Media with the author’s permission.
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