Pro-independence Kanak leader Christian Téin will remain in a mainland French jail for the time being, a Court of Appeal has ruled in Nouméa.
This followed an earlier ruling on October 22 from the Court of Cassation, which is tasked to rule on possible procedural mistakes in earlier judgments.
The Court of Cassation found some flaws in the procedure that justified the case being heard again by a Court of Appeal.
Téin’s lawyer, Pierre Ortet, confirmed his client’s detention in a mainland prison (Mulhouse jail, north-eastern France) has been maintained as a result of the latest Court of Appeal hearing behind closed doors in Nouméa on Friday.
But he also told local media he now intends to bring the case to the European Court of Human Rights, as well as United Nations’ human rights mechanisms — especially on the circumstances that surrounded Téin’s transfer to France on 23 June 2024 on board a specially-chartered plane four days after his arrest in Nouméa on June 19.
Nouméa Public Prosecutor Yves Dupas told local media in an interview on Friday that in this case the next step should happen “some time in January”, when a criminal chamber of the Court of Cassation is expected to deliver another ruling.
Reacting to recent comments made by pro-independence party Union Calédonienne, which maintains Téin is a political prisoner, Dupas said Téin and others facing similar charges “are still presumed innocent”, but “are not political prisoners, they have not been held in relation to a political motive”.
Alleged crimes
The alleged crimes, he said, were “crimes and delicts related to organised crime”.
The seven charges include complicity as part of murder attempts, theft involving the use of weapons and conspiracy in view of the preparation of acts of organised crimes.
Téin’s defence maintains it was never his client’s intention to commit such crimes.
Christian Téin is the head of a “Field Action Coordinating Cell” (CCAT), a group created late in 2023 by the largest and oldest pro-independence party Union Calédonienne.
From October 2023 onward, the CCAT organised marches and demonstrations that later degenerated — starting May 13 — into insurrectional riots, arson and looting, causing 13 deaths and an estimated 2.2 billion euros (NZ$3.9 billion) in material damage, mainly in the Greater Nouméa area.
“The judicial inquiry aims at establishing every responsibility, especially at the level of ‘order givers’,” Dupas told local Radio Rythme Bleu on Friday.
He confirmed six persons were still being detained in several jails of mainland France, including Téin.
3 released under ‘judicial control’
Three others have been released under judiciary control with an obligation to remain in mainland France.
“You see, the manifestation of truth requires time. Justice requires serenity, it’s very important”, he commented.
Late August, Téin was also chosen as president of the pro-independence umbrella FLNKS at its congress.
The August 2024 Congress was also marked by the non-attendance of two other main pillars of the movement, UPM and PALIKA, which have since confirmed their intention to distance themselves from FLNKS.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Despite it being illegal in Australia to recruit soldiers for foreign armies, the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) recruiters are hard at work enticing young Australians to join Israel’s army. Michael West Media investigates.
INVESTIGATION:By Yaakov Aharon
The Israeli war machine is in hyperdrive, and it needs new bodies to throw into the fire. In July, The Department of Home Affairs stated that there were only four Australians who had booked flights to Israel and whom it suspected of intending to join the Israel Defence Forces (IDF).
The Australian Border Force intervened with three of the four but clarified that they did not “necessarily prevent them from leaving”.
MWM understands a batch of Australian recruits is due to arrive in Israel in January, and this is not the first batch of recruits to receive assistance as IDF soldiers through this Australian programme.
Many countries encourage certain categories of immigrants and discourage others. However, Israel doesn’t just want Palestinians out and Jews in — they want Jews of fighting age, who will be conscripted shortly after arrival.
The IDF’s “Lone Soldiers” are soldiers who do not have parents living in Israel. Usually, this means 18-year-old immigrants with basic Hebrew who may never have spent longer than a school camp away from home.
There are a range of Israeli government programmes, charities, and community centres that support the Lone Soldiers’ integration into society prior to basic training.
The most robust of these programs is Garin Tzabar, where there are only 90 days between hugging mum and dad goodbye at Sydney Airport and the drill sergeant belting orders in a foreign language.
The Garin Tzabar website. Image: MWM
Garin Tzabar
In 2004, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon asked Minister for Aliyah [Immigration] and Integration, Tzipi Livni, to significantly increase the number of people in the Garin Tzabar programme.
The IDF website states that Garin Tzabar “is a unique project, a collaborative venture of the Meitav Unit in the IDF, the Scout movement, the security-social wing of the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Immigration and Absorption, which began in 1991”. (Translated from Hebrew via Google Translate.)
The Meitav Unit is divided into many different branches, most of which are responsible for overseeing new recruits.
Powerful and unique journalism by @yaakov_aharon on a story that receives shamefully little coverage in Australia; the recruitment of Australians to serve in the Israeli military: https://t.co/OdNVzzMEbx
However, the pride of the Meitav Unit is the branch dedicated to recruiting all the unique population groups that are not subject to the draft (eg. Ultra-Orthodox Jews). This branch is then divided into three further Departments.
In a 2020 interview, the Head of Meitav’s Tzabar Department, Lieutenant Noam Delgo, referred to herself as someone who “recruits olim chadishim (new immigrants).” She stated:
“Our main job in the army is to help Garin Tzabar members to recruit . . . The best thing about Garin Tzabar is the mashakyot (commanders). Every time you wake up in the morning you have two amazing soldiers — really intelligent — with pretty high skills, just managing your whole life, teaching you Hebrew, helping you with all the bureaucratic systems in Israel, getting profiles, seeing doctors and getting those documents, and finishing the whole process.”
The contact point for Australian recruits is Shoval Magal, the executive director of Garin Tzabar Australia. The registered address is a building shared by the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies and the Zionist Council of NSW, the community’s peak bodies in the state.
“Until three months ago, Tali [REDACTED], from Sydney, Australia, and Moises [REDACTED], from Mexico City, were ordinary teenagers. But on December 25, they arrived at their new family here in Israel — the “Garin Tzabar” family, and in a moment, they will become soldiers. In a special project, we accompanied them from the day of admission (to the program) until just before the recruitment.“ (Translated from Hebrew via Google Translate).
Michael Manhaim was the executive director of Garin Tzabar Australia from 2018 to 2023. He wrote an article, “Becoming a Lone Soldier”,’ for the 2021 annual newsletter of Betar Australia, a Zionist youth group for children. In the article, Manhaim writes:
“The programme starts with the unique preparation process in Australia.
. . . It only takes one step; you just need to choose which foot will lead the way. We will be there for the rest.”
A criminal activity MWM is not alleging that any of the parties mentioned in this article have broken the law. It is not a crime if a person chooses to join a foreign army.
A person commits an offence if the person recruits, in Australia, another person to serve in any capacity in or with an armed force in a foreign country.
It is a further offence to facilitate or promote recruitment for a foreign army and to publish recruitment materials. This includes advertising information relating to how a person may serve in a foreign army.
The maximum penalty for each offence is 10 years.
Rawan Arraf, executive director of the Australian Centre for International Justice, said:
“Unless there has been a specific declaration stating it is not an offence to recruit for the Israel Defence Force, recruitment to a foreign armed force is a criminal offence under Australian law, and the Australian Federal Police should be investigating anyone allegedly involved in recruitment for a foreign armed force.”
Army needing ‘new flesh’ If the IDF are to keep the war on Gaza going, they need to fill old suits of body armour with new grunts.
Reports indicate the death toll within IDF’s ranks is unprecedented — a suicide epidemic is claiming further lives on the home front, and reservists are refusing in droves to return to active duty.
In October, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid accused Bibi Netanyahu of obscuring the facts of Israel’s casualty rate. Any national security story published in Israel must first be approved by the intelligence unit at the Military Censor.
“11,000 soldiers were injured and 890 others killed,” Lapid said, without warning and live on air. There are limits to how much we accept the alternative facts”.
In November 2023, Shoval Magal shared a photo in which she is posing alongside six young Australians, saying, “The participants are eager to have Aliya (immigrate) to Israel, start the programme and join the army”.
These six recruits are the attendees of just one of several seminars that Magal has organised in Melbourne for the summer 2023 cycle, having also organised separate events across cities in Australia.
Magal’s June 2024 newsletter said she was “in the advanced stages of the preparation phase in Australia for the August 2024 Garin”. Most recently, in October 2024, she was “getting ready for Garin Tzabar’s 2024 December cycle.”
Magal’s newsletter for Israeli Scouts in Australia ‘Aliyah Events – November 2024’. Image: MWM
There are five “Aliyah (Immigration) Events” in Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. The sponsoring organisations are Garin Tzabar, the Israeli Ministry for Aliyah (Immigration) and Integration, and a who’s who of the Jewish-Australian community.
The star speaker at each event is Alon Katz, an Australian who joined Garin Tzabar in 2018 and is today a reserve IDF soldier. The second speaker, Colonel Golan Vach, was the subject of two Electronic Intifadainvestigations alleging that he had invented the 40 burned babies lie on October 7 to create a motive for Israel’s onslaught in Gaza.
If any Australian signed the papers to become an IDF recruit at these events, is someone liable for the offence of recruiting them to a foreign army?
MWM reached out for comment to Garin Tzabar Australia and the Zionist Federation of Australia to clarify whether the IDF is recruiting in Australia but did not receive a reply.
Yaakov Aharon is a Jewish-Australian journalist living in Wollongong. He enjoys long walks on Wollongong Beach, unimpeded by Port Kembla smoke fumes and AUKUS submarines. First published by Michael West Media and republished with permission.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Twenty five Pacific civil society organisations and solidarity movements have called on Pacific leaders of their “longstanding responsibility” to West Papua, and to urgently address the “ongoing gross human rights abuses” by Indonesia.
The organisations — including the Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC), Fiji Council of Social Services (FCOSS). Pacific Network on Globalisation (PANG), Fiji Women’s Crisis Centre (FWCC) and Vanuatu Human Rights Coalition — issued a statement marking 1 December 2024.
This date commemorates 63 years since the Morning Star flag was first
raised in West Papua to signify the territory’s sovereignty.
The organisations condemned the “false narrative Indonesia has peddled of itself as a morally upright, peace-loving, and benevolent friend of the Melanesian people and of the Pacific”.
Jakarta had “infiltrated our governments and institutional perceptions”.
The statement also said:
Yet Indonesia’s annexation of the territory, military occupation, and violent oppression, gross human rights violations on West Papuans continue to be ignored internationally and unfortunately by most Pacific leaders.
The deepening relations between Pacific states and Jakarta reflect how far the false narrative Indonesia has peddled of itself as a morally upright, peace-loving, and benevolent friend of the Melanesian people and of the Pacific, has infiltrated our governments and institutional perceptions.
The corresponding dilution of our leaders’ voice, individually and collectively, is indicative of political and economic complicity, staining the Pacific’s anti-colonial legacy, and is an attack on the core values of our regional solidarity.
The Pacific has a legacy of holding colonial powers in our region to account. The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) Leaders communiques in 2015, 2017, and 2019 are reflective of this, deploring the violence and human rights violations in West Papua, calling on Indonesia to allow independent human rights assessment in the territory, and to address the root causes of conflict through peaceful means.
In 2023, PIF Leaders appointed Fiji and Papua New Guinea (PNG) Prime Ministers, [Sitiveni] Rabuka and [James] Marape respectively to facilitate such constructive engagement with Indonesia.
As PIF envoys, both Prime Ministers visited Indonesia in 2023 on separate occasions, yet they have failed to address these concerns. Is this to be interpreted as regional political expediency or economic self-interest?
Today, torture, discrimination, extrajudicial killings, unlawful arrests, and detention of West Papuans continue to be rife. Approximately 70,000 Papuans remain displaced due to military operations.
Between January and September this year, human rights violations resulted in a total of over 1300 victims across various categories. The most significant violations were arbitrary detention, with 331 victims in 20 cases, and freedom of assembly, which affected at least 388 victims in 21 cases. Other violations included ill-treatment (98 victims), torture (23 victims), and killings (15 victims), along with freedom of expression violations impacting 31 victims.
Additionally, cultural rights violations affected dozens of individuals, while intimidation cases resulted in 15 victims. Disappearances accounted for 2 victims, and right to health violations impacted dozens.
This surge in human rights abuses highlights a concerning trend, with arbitrary detention and freedom of assembly violations standing out as the most widespread and devastating.
The commemoration of the Morning Star flag-raising this 1st of December is a solemn reminder of the region’s unfinished duty of care to the West Papuan people and their struggle for human rights, including the right to self-determination.
Clearly, Pacific leaders, including the Special Envoys, must fulfill their responsibility to a region of genuine peace and solidarity, and thereby rectify their unconscionable response thus far.
They must do justice to the 63 years of resilient resistance by the West Papuan people under violent, even deadly repression.
We call on leaders, especially the Prime Ministers of Fiji and PNG, not to succumb to Indonesia’s chequebook diplomacy and other soft-power overtures now evident in education, the arts, culture, food and agriculture, security, and even health sectors.
We remind our Pacific leaders of their responsibility to 63 years of injustice by Indonesia, and the resilience of the West Papuan people against this oppression to this day.
In solidarity with the people of West Papua, we demand that our leaders:
Honour the resolutions of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) and PIF, which call for a peaceful resolution to the West Papua conflict and the recognition of the rights of West Papuans;
Take immediate and concrete action to review, and if necessary, sanction Indonesia’s status as a dialogue partner in the PIF, associate member of the MSG, and as a party to other privileged bilateral and multilateral arrangements in our Pacific region on the basis of its human rights record in West Papua;
Stand firm against Indonesia’s colonial intrusion into the Pacific through its cheque-book and other diplomatic overtures, ensuring that the sovereignty and rights of the people of West Papua are not sacrificed for political or economic gain; and
PIF must take immediate action to establish a Regional Human Rights Commission or task force, support independent investigations into human rights violations in West Papua, and ensure accountability for all abuses.
New Caledonia’s largest pro-independence party, the Union Calédonienne (UC), has unveiled the main outcome of its congress last weekend, including its plans for the French Pacific territory’s political future.
Speaking at a news conference on Thursday in Nouméa, the party’s newly-elected executive bureau, now headed by Emmanuel Tjibaou, debriefed the media about the main resolutions made during its congress.
One of the motions was specifically concerning a timeframe for New Caledonia’s road to independence.
Tjibaou said UC now envisaged that one of the milestones on this road to sovereignty would be the signing of a “Kanaky Agreement”, at the latest on 24 September 2025 — a highly symbolic date as this was the day of France’s annexation of New Caledonia in 1853.
‘Kanaky Agreement’ by 24 September 2025? This, he said, would mark the beginning of a five-year “transition period” from “2025 to 2030” that would be concluded by New Caledonia becoming fully sovereign under a status yet to be defined.
Several wordings have recently been advanced by stakeholders from around the political spectrum.
Depending on the pro-independence and pro-France sympathies, these have varied from “shared sovereignty”, “independence in partnership”, “independence-association” and, more recently, from the also divided pro-France loyalists camp, an “internal federalism” (Le Rassemblement-LR party) or a “territorial federation” (Les Loyalistes).
Charismatic pro-independence leader Jean-Marie Tjibaou, Emmanuel’s father who was assassinated in 1989, was known for being an advocate of a relativist approach to the term “independence”, to which he usually preferred to adjunct the pragmatic term “inter-dependence”.
Founding FLNKS leader Jean Marie Tjibaou in Kanaky New Caledonia in 1985 . . . assassinated four years later. Image: David Robie/Café Pacific
Negotiations between all political parties and the French State are expected to begin in the next few weeks.
The talks (between pro-independence, anti-independence parties and the French State) are scheduled in such a way that all parties manage to reach a comprehensive and inclusive political agreement no later than March 2025.
The talks had completely stalled after the pro-indeoendence riots broke out on 13 May 2024.
Over the past three years, following three referendums (2018, 2020, 2021, the latter being strongly challenged by the pro-independence side) on the question of independence (all yielding a majority in favour of New Caledonia remaining part of France), there had been several attempts to hold inclusive talks in order to discuss New Caledonia’s political future.
But UC and other parties (including pro-France and pro-independence) did not manage to sit at the same table.
Speaking to journalists, Emmanuel Tjibaou confirmed that under its new leadership, UC was now willing to return to the negotiating table.
He said “May 13 has stopped our advances in those exchanges” but “now is the time to build the road to full sovereignty”.
Back to the negotiating table In the footsteps of those expected negotiations, heavy campaigning will follow to prepare for crucial provincial elections to be held no later than November 2025.
The five years of “transition” (2025-2030), would be used to transfer the remaining “regal” powers from France as well as putting in place “a political, financial and international” framework, accompanied by the French State, Tjibaou elaborated.
And after the transitional period, UC’s president said a new phase of talks could start to put in place what he terms “interdependence conventions on some of the ‘regal’ — main — powers” (defence, law and order, foreign affairs, currency).
Tjibaou said this project could resemble a sort of independence in partnership, a “shared sovereignty”, a concept that was strongly suggested early November 2024 by visiting French Senate President Gérard Larcher.
But Tjibaou said there was a difference in the sense that those discussions on sharing would only take place once all the powers have been transferred from France.
“You can only share sovereignty if you have obtained it first”, he told local media.
One of the other resolutions from its congress held last weekend in the small village of Mia (Canala) was to reiterate its call to liberate Christian Téin, appointed president of the FLNKS (Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front) in absentia late August, even though he is currently imprisoned in Mulhouse (north-east of France) pending his trial.
Allegations over May riots
He is alleged to have been involved in the organisation of the demonstrations that degenerated into the May 13 riots, arson, looting and a deadly toll of 13 people, several hundred injured and material damage estimated at some 2.2 billion euros (NZ$3.9 billion).
Tjibaou also said that within a currently divided pro-independence movement, he hoped that a reunification process and “clarification” would be possible with other components of FLNKS, namely the Progressist Union in Melanesia (UPM) and the Kanak Liberation Party (PALIKA).
Since August 2024, both UPM and PALIKA have de facto withdrawn with FLNKS’s political bureau, saying they no longer recognised themselves in the way the movement had radicalised.
In 1988, after half a decade of a quasi civil war, Jean-Marie Tjibaou signed the Matignon-Oudinot agreements with New Caledonia’s pro-France and anti-independence leader Jacques Lafleur.
The third signatory was the French State.
One year later, in 1989, Tjibaou was shot dead by a hard-line pro-independence militant.
His son Emmanuel was aged 13 at the time.
‘Common destiny’
In 1998, a new agreement, the Nouméa Accord, was signed, with a focus on increased autonomy, the notions of “common destiny” and a local “citizenship” and a gradual transfer of powers from France.
After the three referendums held between 2018 and 2021, the Nouméa Accord prescribed that if there had been three referendums rejecting independence, then political stakeholders should “meet to examine the situation thus generated”.
On Thursday, Union Calédonienne also stressed that the Nouméa Accord remained the founding document of all future political discussions.
“We are sticking to the Nouméa Accord because it is this document that brings us to the elements of accession to sovereignty”.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The ruling Chinese Communist Party has placed Miao Hua, a high-ranking defense official, under investigation for “serious violations of discipline,” a phrase often used to denote an internal party corruption probe.
“Miao Hua, member of the Central Military Commission and director of the Political Work Department of the Military Commission, is suspected of serious violations of discipline,” defense spokesperson Col. Wu Qian told a news conference in Beijing on Thursday.
“After research by the Party Central Committee, it has been decided to suspend Miao Hua from his duties pending investigation,” Wu said.
The announcement came a day after the Financial Times newspaper reported that Admiral Dong Jun, who was named as successor to Li Shangfu in December 2023 after Li was fired for corruption, was himself being investigated for graft.
Wu dismissed the report on Thursday as “pure fabrication and rumor with ulterior motives.”
“China does not accept such reports,” he said, but gave no further details of the investigation into Miao Hua.
Chinese Defense Minister Dong Jun attends the ASEAN China Defense Ministers’ meeting in Vientiane, Laos, Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024.
Current affairs commentator Cai Shenkun said Miao was taken away for investigation on Nov. 9, adding that Dong Jun is his former subordinate.
“Dong Jun was put forward [for defense minister] by Miao Hua, who recommended him to Xi Jinping,” Cai told RFA Mandarin in an interview on Thursday. “There was a lot of controversy over his appointment, because he had only ever served in the navy, and had never fought on the front line.”
He said any corruption on Dong Jun’s part was unlikely to be serious.
“He has never worked in a particularly lucrative department, and naval cadres don’t have that much power anyway,” Cai said.
He said if Dong was assisting party investigators with their inquiry, it would like be in the role of Miao’s former subordinate, and that close associates of Miao could fall with him.
Refused to meet Austin
A former admiral and commander of the Chinese navy, Dong was appointed minister of national defense in December 2023, replacing Li Shangfu who was removed in October 2023 after just seven months in office.
The last time Dong appeared in public was on Nov. 21 when he attended the ASEAN Defense Ministers’ Meeting-Plus in Vientiane, Laos.
Miao Hua, right, China’s director of the political affairs department of the Central Military Commission arrives at the Pyongyang Airport in Pyongyang, North Korea Monday, Oct. 14, 2019.
While holding talks with the defense chiefs of New Zealand, India, and Malaysia, as well as the ASEAN secretary-general, Dong refused a meeting with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.
Beijing blamed it on Washington for undermining China’s “core interests” by providing weapons to Taiwan.
A native of Shandong province from where Xi’s wife Peng Liyuan also hails, Dong –- as well as his predecessor Li Shangfu -– was believed to be appointed by Xi.
Yet Dong wasn’t promoted to the Central Military Commission, the top military leadership of the Communist Party, nor was he appointed to the State Council, or the national cabinet.
In China, defense ministers are usually members of both those bodies and Dong’s non-appointment had raised questions about his position.
Former ministers Li Shangfu and Wei Fenghe were expelled from the Communist Party for “grave discipline violations” such as taking bribes and causing great damage to the images of the party and its senior leaders, according to official statements.
Series of sackings
The investigation into Miao follows a slew of sackings at the highest levels of the People’s Liberation Army in recent months.
Analysts said they believed that the expulsions were related to the corruption over equipment procurement by the rocket force.
But they also link the purges to ongoing dissent within the Chinese military about its readiness to stage an invasion of democratic Taiwan, which has said it has no wish to submit to “peaceful unification” under Beijing’s territorial claim on the island.
An academic who gave only the surname Song for fear of reprisals said Xi’s enthusiasm for an invasion may not be shared by actual military commanders, who fear China may not win such a war.
“Even if the current boss [Xi] wants to attack Taiwan and work with Putin to change the global order for a century to come, real soldiers and generals know whether or not such a war can be won,” Song said. “The actual military commanders are the ones who know whether their forces are up to the fight, and whether the morale is there.”
China’s then-Minister of National Defence Li Shangfu salutes the audience before delivering a speech during the 20th Shangri-La Dialogue summit in Singapore on June 4, 2023.
“The last two defense ministers, Wei Fenghe and Li Shangfu, were removed because they knew it couldn’t be won, and mustn’t be fought,” he said. “That, I think, is the most important reason.”
China froze top-level military talks and other dialogue with the U.S. in 2022 after then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi became the highest-ranking U.S. official in 25 years to visit Taiwan.
The island has never been ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, nor formed part of the People’s Republic of China, and its 23 million people have no wish to give up their sovereignty or democratic way of life to be ruled by Beijing, according to recent opinion polls.
China, which hasn’t ruled out an invasion to force reunification, was infuriated by the Pelosi visit and canceled military-to-military talks, including contacts between theater-level commanders.
President Joe Biden persuaded his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, to resume contacts in November 2023, when they met on the sidelines of an APEC summit in Woodside, California.
Translated by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Malcolm Foster.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Qian Lang for RFA Mandarin.
Palestinian diaspora poets, singers and musicians gathered today with solidarity partners from Aotearoa New Zealand, African nations — including South Africa — in a vibrant celebration.
The Chinese military held a large-scale maritime and airspace patrol near the Scarborough shoal, a disputed reef in the South China Sea known in China as Huangyan Dao, citing “instability” created by “certain countries.”
Scarborough Shoal, known as Bajo de Masinloc in the Philippines, is about 125 nautical miles (232 kilometers) from the main Philippine island of Luzon. China now effectively controls it, even though a landmark international arbitration case in 2016 rejected Beijing’s claims to most of the South China Sea.
The People’s Liberation Army, or PLA, Southern Theater Command, responsible for the contested waterway, said in a statement on Thursday that navy and air forces were taking part in the “routine training” which included reconnaissance and early warning; and maritime and airspace patrol near the shoal.
The Philippines has not reacted to the news but in the past Manila has repeatedly protested against what it saw as “China’s bullying.”
Also on Thursday, a U.S. aircraft carrier strike group entered the South China Sea, according to ship-tracking data obtained and analyzed by Radio Free Asia.
Data from the MarineTraffic website show the nuclear-powered USS Abraham Lincoln, or CVN-72, transited the Singapore Strait and entered the South China Sea on Thursday morning before moving northeast. Unusually, the ship has its automatic identification system, which shows its location, turned on.
‘Stirring up trouble’
The Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group also includes Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyer USS Frank E. Petersen Jr., and destroyers USS Spruance and USS Michael Murphy.
The destroyers have just visited Thailand and Singapore, and are now “underway conducting routine operations in the U.S. 7th Fleet area of operations,” the U.S. Navy said.
USS Abraham Lincoln is the fifth aircraft carrier of the Nimitz class that comprises the largest warships in the world. The U.S. 7th Fleet is the U.S. Navy’s largest forward-deployed fleet with a continuous presence in the Indo-Pacific for more than 75 years.
The navy said in a news release that the fleet “routinely interacts and operates with allies and partners in preserving a free and open Indo-Pacific region.”
In its statement, the PLA Southern Theater Command criticized “certain countries from outside the region” that were “stirring up trouble” and creating instability in the South China Sea but did not name any country.
It reiterated that China has “indisputable sovereignty” over Huangyan Dao and its surrounding waters, and that Chinese troops would “resolutely” defend national sovereignty and maritime rights.
Edited by Taejun Kang.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by RFA Staff.
TAIPEI, Taiwan – G7 foreign ministers called on China to oppose North Korea’s growing military ties with Russia, while NATO recommended its members employ diplomatic and economic levers to discourage Beijing from aiding Moscow.
China, one of North Korea’s few traditional allies, has recently been under growing pressure to serve as a responsible stakeholder as the United States and its allies worry that the deployment of North Korean troops will dangerously escalate the Ukrainian war.
“We are seriously concerned about the deployment of the DPRK’s troops to Russia and their use on the battlefield against Ukraine … We urge countries with ties to Russia and the DPRK, including China, to uphold international law by opposing this dangerous expansion of the conflict and implementing all relevant UNSC resolutions,” foreign ministers of the Group of Seven said in a statement on Tuesday.
DPRK refers to North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, while UNSC is short for the U. N. Security Council.
“We condemn in the strongest possible terms the increasing military cooperation between DPRK and Russia, including DPRK’s export and Russia’s procurement of North Korean ballistic missiles and munitions in direct violation of relevant UNSC Resolutions, as well as Russia’s use of these missiles and munitions against Ukraine,” they added.
Separately, NATO recommended its members discourage China through diplomacy from aiding Russia.
“It [the NATO Parliamentary Assembly] recommended employing diplomatic and economic levers to discourage China from aiding Russia,” the security bloc’s assembly said on Tuesday.
“The Assembly called for tightening sanctions on Russia and North Korea, citing Pyongyang’s growing military support for Moscow,” it added.
In a video message to the assembly, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte sought support for Ukraine in its war against Russia and its allies.
“There’s war in Europe. We see China, Iran, North Korea and Russia joining forces to undermine us, and threats continue to transcend borders, from terrorism to cyber attacks. So it is vital that NATO becomes stronger, more capable and more agile,” Rutte said.
China has not commented on North Korea’s deployment except to say the development of relations between Russia and North Korea was solely for them to decide.
U.S. President Joe Biden, during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Peru on Nov. 16, condemned North Korea’s decision to send its troops to Russia to assist in the war against Ukraine, while expressing “deep concern over [China’s] continued support for Russia’s defense industrial base.”
At that time, Xi said that China’s position regarding the war had “always been fair and square,” adding Beijing would “not allow conflict and turmoil to happen on the Korean Peninsula” and that it would “not sit idly by” while its strategic interests are endangered.
The U.S. and South Korea have said that North Korean troops had been fighting against Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk region, parts of which Ukrainian forces occupied in early August.
Washington has estimated more than 10,000 North Korean soldiers had been sent to Kursk and had begun combat operations alongside Russian forces.
Neither Russia nor North Korea have confirmed the presence of North Korean troops.
But South Korea’s main security agency confirmed on Monday that it had “specific intelligence” that North Korean forces in Russia had suffered casualties, though it gave no figures. Media reported that 500 North Koreans and one high-level North Korean official had been killed in a Ukrainian attack with British missiles last week.
Ukraine also said North Korea had sent more than 100 ballistic missiles to Russia, along with military specialists, to support its war with Ukraine.
Edited by Mike Firn.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Taejun Kang for RFA.
New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters has used a speech in Paris to urge France to keep an open mind about a new path forward for New Caledonia.
He also wants to deepen New Zealand’s relationship with France, and wants a stronger focus from the European country on the Pacific.
Titled “The Path Less Travelled” in a nod to American poet Robert Frost, the half-hour speech was delivered to the French Institute of International Relations to an audience that included dignitaries from the government and the diplomatic corps.
Peters highlighted geopolitical trends: a shift in countries’ focus from rules to power, from economics to security and defence, and from economic efficiencies to resilience and sustainability.
“These shifts present challenges for a small trade-dependent country like New Zealand. Some of these challenges are familiar, but others, those mostly driven by technology, are new,” Peters said.
After speaking about the value of free trade agreements — highlighted by New Zealand’s recent FTA with the European Union — he raised the spectre of security flashpoints, including the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait.
“We are also deeply concerned by North Korea’s evolving nuclear capability and ambition. Those concerns are heightened by its supply of troops to Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, another flagrant breach of international law and UN resolutions.”
‘Relentless securitisation of the Pacific’
“The relentless securitisation of the Pacific and a breakdown in long-standing cooperation norms in Antarctica mean New Zealand cannot stay out of the way of geopolitics.”
He pointed to New Zealand’s foreign policy agenda, including a focus on South East Asia and India, neighbours in the Pacific, tackling multi-country problems through multilateral discussion, setting up new multilateral groupings to navigate “impasses or blockages”, and promoting the coalition’s goal of boosting export values through diplomacy.
“To achieve this ambitious agenda, we knew we needed to give more energy, more urgency, and a sharper focus to three inter-connected lines of effort: Investing in our relationships, growing our prosperity, and strengthening our security.
He urged France to deepen the relationship with New Zealand, helping advance Pacific priorities and protecting the international rules-based order, drawing on France’s interest and involvement in the region, as well as its diplomatic, development, military and humanitarian supports.
“As a country, we’ve got the tools to make a big impact . . . Pacific regionalism sits at the core of New Zealand’s Pacific approach … but New Zealand cannot meet these needs alone,” he said.
“We will increasingly look to cooperate with our traditional partners like France and other close partners who share our values and interests. We want to deepen our cooperation with France to advance Pacific priorities, to strengthen existing regional architecture, to protect the international rules-based order, and to ensure the prosperity of future Pacific generations.”
If the French needed encouragement, Peters pointed to the shared values that underpin the partnership, saying the two countries “share the same democratic pulse”, saying the fraternité — brotherhood — of France’s motto evoked a sense of moral obligation for governments “to protect all of their their citizens and provide them with the conditions to prosper”.
New Caledonia at ‘turning point’ Peters soon turned to the deadly riots in New Caledonia, saying New Zealand welcomed the efforts to restore security and help get foreigners including New Zealanders out.
The agreements between Paris and Nouméa in the 1980s and 1990s, he said, represented the road less travelled, “one where France and New Caledonia walked together”.
“But now, in 2024, that road has become overgrown and blocked by choices already made and actions already taken.”
The archipelago remains in something of a standoff after the riots that broke out in May over calls for independence.
France retains control of the military, but Fiji’s Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka — after a long-delayed visit alongside his Cook Islands and Tonga and the Solomon Islands Foreign Minister — this month offered to deploy a peacekeeping force under the Pacific Policing Initiative.
Peters urged France to think carefully about its next steps, and keep an open mind about the path forward.
“That in Nouméa and Paris, the key to restore the spirit of earlier understandings is for all parties to have open minds about their next crucial choice, about a new path forward, because France and the people of New Caledonia stand at a new turning point,” he said.
“Rather than dwell on old questions, we think there is an opening for everyone who cares about New Caledonia to use our imaginations to think of a new question.
“There are all sorts of constitutional models out there, including across the Pacific. For instance, New Zealand has learned from its experience of having different types of constitutional relationships with realm countries — the Cook Islands, Niue, and Tokelau.
“Our realm relationships are stable and mutually beneficial, so enduring, and the constitutional mechanisms provide for maximum self-determination while ensuring that New Zealand’s security and defence interests remain protected.”
Peters said New Zealand deeply respected France’s role in the region, “and we are in no doubt that the economic might of France is essential to reestablishing a vibrant New Caledonian economy”.
“We stand ready to help in any way we can, and we trust France appreciates . . . ‘there is nothing better than the encouragement of a good friend’, because that is the animating spirit behind our words today.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The election of Emmanuel Tjibaou as the new president of New Caledonia’s main pro-independence party, the Union Calédonienne (UC), has triggered a whole range of political reactions — mostly favourable, some more cautious.
Within the pro-independence camp, the two main moderate parties UPM (Progressist Union in Melanesia) and PALIKA (Kanak Liberation Party), have reacted favourably, although they have recently distanced themselves from UC.
UPM leader Victor Tutugoro hailed Tjibaou’s election while pointing out that it was “not easy” . . . “given the difficult circumstances”.
“It’s courageous of him to take this responsibility,” he told public broadcaster NC la 1ère.
“He is a man of dialogue, a pragmatic man.”
PALIKA leader Jean-Pierre Djaïwé reacted similarly, saying Tjibaou “is well aware that the present situation is very difficult”.
Both PALIKA and UPM hoped the new UC leadership could have the potential to pave the way for a reconciliation between all members of the Kanak Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS), which has been experiencing profound differences for the past few years.
‘Real generational change’
On the pro-France (and therefore anti-independence) side, which is also divided, the moderate Calédonie Ensemble’s Philippe Michel saw in this new leadership a “real generational change” and noted that Tjibaou’s “appeasing” style could build new bridges between opposing sides of New Caledonia’s political spectrum.
“We’ll have to leave him some time to put his mark on UC’s operating mode,” Michel said.
“We all have to find our way back towards an agreement.”
Over the past two years, attempts from France to have all parties reach an agreement that could potentially produce a document to succeed the 1998 Nouméa autonomy Accord have failed, partly because of UC’s refusal to attend discussions involving all parties around the same table.
Pro-France Rassemblement-LR President Alcide Ponga said it was a big responsibility Tjibaou had on his shoulders in the coming months.
“Because we have these negotiations coming on how to exit the Nouméa Accord.
“I think it’s good that everyone comes back to the table — this is something New Caledonians are expecting.”
‘Wait and see’
Gil Brial, vice-president of a more radical pro-France Les Loyalistes, had a “wait and see” approach.
“We’re waiting now to see what motions UC has endorsed,” he said.
“Because if it’s returning to negotiations with only one goal, of accessing independence, despite three referendums which rejected independence, it won’t make things any simpler.”
Brial said he was well aware that UC’s newly-elected political bureau now included about half of “moderate” members, and the rest remained more radical.
“We want to see which of these trends will take the lead, who will act as negotiators and for what goal.”
UC has yet to publish the exact content of the motions adopted by its militants following its weekend congress.
Les Loyalistes leader and Southern province President Sonia Backès also reacted to Tjibaou’s election, saying this was “expected”.
Writing on social media, she expressed the hope that under its new leadership, UC would now “constructively return to the negotiating table”.
She said her party’s approach was “wait and see, without any naivety”.
Tjibaou’s first post-election comments Tjibaou told journalists: “Now we have to pull up our sleeves and also shed some light on what has transpired since the 13 May (insurrection riots).”
He also placed a high priority on the upcoming political talks on New Caledonia’s institutional and political future.
“We still need to map out a framework and scope — what negotiations, what framework, what contents for this new agreement everyone is calling for.
“What we’ll be looking for is an agreement towards full emancipation and sovereignty. Based on this, we’ll have to build.”
He elaborated on Monday by defining UC’s pro-independence intentions as “a basket of negotiations”.
He, like his predecessor Daniel Goa, also placed a strong emphasis on the need for UC to take stock of past shortcomings (especially in relation to the younger generations) in order to “transform and move forward”.
CCAT ‘an important tool’
Asked about his perception of the role a UC-created “field action coordinating cell” (CCAT) has played in the May riots, Tjibaou said this remained “an important tool, especially to mobilise our militants on the ground”.
“But [CCAT] objectives have to be well-defined at all times.
“There is no political motion from UC that condones violence as a means to reach our goals.
“If abuses have been committed, justice will take its course.”
Emmanuel Tjibaou being interviewed by public broadcaster NC la 1ère in August 2024. Image: NC la 1ère screenshot/RNZ
At its latest congress in August 2024 (which both UPM and PALIKA decided not to attend), the FLNKS appointed CCAT leader Christian Téin as its new president.
Téin is in jail in Mulhouse in the north-east of France, following his arrest in June and pending his trial.
In the newly-elected UC political bureau, the UC’s congress, which was held in the small village of Mia (near Canala, East Coast of the main island of Grande Terre) has maintained Téin as the party’s “commissar-general”.
Tjibaou only candidate
Tjibaou was the only candidate for the president’s position.
His election on Sunday comes as UC’s former leader, Daniel Goa, 71, announced last week that he did not intend to seek another mandate, partly for health reasons, after leading the party for the past 12 years.
Goa told militants this was a “heavy burden” his successor would now have to carry.
He also said there was a need to work on political awareness and training for the younger generations.
He said the heavy involvement of the youth in the recent riots, not necessarily within the UC’s political framework, was partly caused by “all these years during which we did not train (UC) political commissioners” on the ground.
He told local media at the weekend this has been “completely neglected”, saying this was his mea culpa.
After the riots started, there was a perception that calls for calm coming from UC and other political parties were no longer heeded and that, somehow, the whole insurrection had got out of control.
The 48-year-old Tjibaou was also elected earlier this year as one of New Caledonia’s two representatives to the French National Assembly (Lower House in the French Parkiament).
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
At least six Israeli soldiers have taken their own lives in recent months, the major Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth has revealed, citing severe psychological distress caused by prolonged wars in the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon as the primary cause, Anadolu Agency reports.
The investigation suggests that the actual number of suicides may be higher, as the Israeli military has yet to release official figures, despite a promise to disclose them by the end of the year.
The report highlights a broader mental health crisis within the Israeli army.
Regional tension has escalated due to Israel’s brutal offensive on the Gaza Strip, which has killed more than 44,000 people, mostly women and children, since a Hamas attack last year.
Thousands of soldiers have sought help from military mental health clinics or field psychologists, with approximately a third of those affected showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
According to the investigation, the number of soldiers suffering psychological trauma may exceed those with physical injuries from the war.
The daily cites experts as saying the full extent of this mental health crisis will become clear once military operations are completed and troops return to normal life.
About 1700 soldiers treated
In March, Lucian Tatsa-Laur, head of the Israeli military’s Mental Health Department, told another Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, that approximately 1700 soldiers had received psychological treatment.
Since October 7 last year, reports Anadolu, Israeli military is alleged to have wiped out families in Gaza, pulverised neighbourhoods, dug up mass graves, destroyed cemeteries, bombed shops and businesses, flattened hospitals and morgues, ran tanks and bulldozers on dead bodies, tortured jailed Palestinians with dogs and electricity, subjected detainees to mock executions, and even raped many Palestinians.
Exhibiting sadistic behaviour during the genocide, Israeli soldiers have taunted Palestinian prisoners by claiming they were playing football with their children’s heads in Gaza.
Israeli troops have live streamed hundreds of videos of soldiers looting Palestinian homes, destroying children’s beds, setting homes on fire and laughing, wearing undergarments of displaced Palestinians and stealing children’s toys.
In their mission to “erase” Palestine, Israeli troops have killed a record number of babies, medics, athletes, and journalists — unprecedented in any war in this century.
But, said the news agency, now it’s coming with a cost.
Australia bars former minister
Meanwhile, former Israeli Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked has been banned from entering Australia over fears of “incitement”.
Shaked, a former MP for the far-right Yamina party, was scheduled to appear at a conference hosted by the pro-Israel Australia Israel and Jewish Affairs Council (AIJAC).
However, the Australian Department of Home Affairs told the former minister on Thursday that she had been denied a visa to travel to the country under the Migration Act.
The act allows the government to deny entry to individuals likely to “vilify Australians” or “incite discord” within the local community.
Speaking to Israeli media, Shaked claimed that her ban was due to her vocal opposition to a Palestinian state, reports Middle East Eye.
She has also previously called for the removal of “all two million” Palestinians from Gaza.
A national New Zealand solidarity movement for Palestine has welcomed the International Criminal Court’s move to issue arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, saying it is a “wake up call” for the coalition government.
“The warrants mean for the first time Israeli leaders face accountability for war crimes which have been live-streamed on social media for the past 13 months” said national chair John Minto of the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA).
“We are waiting for our government to announce it will arrest Netanyahu and Gallant immediately if they set foot in Aotearoa New Zealand.”
Many countries among the 124 members of the ICC have been quick to declare that they would honour the arrest obligations, among them Canada, France and Italy. Also the European Union’s foreign policy chief said all EU countries should abide by the ruling.
“These decisions are binding on all states party to the Rome Statute, which includes all EU member states,” said Joseph Borrell.
On the ICC’s arrest warrants for Israel’s PM Netanyahu and ex-minister Gallant, and Hamas leader Deif, the EU’s foreign policy chief Borrell said: “These decisions are binding on all states party to the Rome Statute, which includes all EU member states.” pic.twitter.com/dK5tyjyKtv
Both Israel and its key backer, United States, refuse to recognise the ICC jurisdiction.
PSNA’s Minto said in a statement today: “It’s a breath of fresh air from the stultifying refusal of New Zealand and other Western governments to act against the perpetrators of industrial-scale slaughter of Palestinian civilians.
“This ICC decision is a wake-up call for our government which can no longer stay silent.
“New Zealand has been a staunch ally of the US/Israel throughout the past 13 months when it should have been a staunch defender of international law.
“Unbelievably, our government still refuses to call for an immediate, permanent ceasefire and while it has condemned every act of Palestinian resistance, it has refused to condemn any of the egregious Israeli war crimes which are the subject of the arrest warrants.”
The ICC warrants are a turning point. The world is uniting behind the rule of international law. pic.twitter.com/dqky1SprqO
In response to the ICC decision, New Zealand should immediately end support for Israel to continue its war crimes such as:
Suspend all satellite launches by Rocket lab for BlackSky Technology, Capella Space, and HawkEye 360. These companies provide imaging data used by Israeli for its targeting of civilian infrastructure in Gaza and Lebanon.
Suspend and independently investigate the export of crystal oscillators from Rakon Industries which end up in bombs used for war crimes in Gaza and Lebanon, and
Impose sanctions against Israel — they are also essential and the ICC decision can be the trigger.
“New Zealand needs to act as we did when the ICC issued arrest warrants against Russian leader Vladimir Putin for the invasion of Ukraine” said Minto.
“New Zealand imposed immediate and wide-ranging sanctions against Russia and must follow through with Israel.”
The United States has vetoed a UN Security Council ceasefire resolution — for the fourth time — in Israel’s war on Gaza, while Hezbollah demands a complete ceasefire and “protection of Lebanon’s sovereignty” in any deal with Israel. Amid the death and devastation, Joe Hendren reflects on his time in Lebanon and examines what the crisis means for a small country with a population size similar to Aotearoa New Zealand.
SPECIAL REPORT: By Joe Hendren
Since the Israeli invasion of Lebanon I can’t help but think of a friend I met in Beirut.
He worked at the Regis Hotel, where I stayed in February 2015.
At one point, he offered to make me a Syrian dish popular in his hometown of Aleppo. I have long remembered his kindness; I only wish I remembered his name.
At the time, his home city was being destroyed. A flashpoint of the Syrian Civil War, the Battle of Aleppo lasted four long years. He didn’t mention this of course.
I was lucky to visit Lebanon when I did. So much has happened since then.
Economic crisis and a tragic port explosion Mass protests took over Lebanese streets in October 2019 in response to government plans to tax WhatsApp calls. The scope of the protests soon widened, as Lebanese people voiced their frustrations with ongoing economic turmoil and corruption.
A few months later, the covid-19 pandemic arrived, deepening the economic crisis and claiming 10,000 lives.
On 4 August 2020, the centre of Beirut was rocked by one of the largest non nuclear explosions in history when a large amount of ammonium nitrate stored at the Port of Beirut detonated. The explosion killed 218 people and left an estimated 300,000 homeless. The government of Hassin Diab resigned but continued in a “caretaker” capacity.
Tens of thousands of protesters returned to the streets demanding accountability and the downfall of Lebanon’s political ruling class. While some protesters threw stones and other projectiles, an Al Jazeera investigation found that security forces violated international standards on the use of force. The political elite were protected.
“The Lebanon financial and economic crisis is likely to rank in the top 10, possibly top three, most severe crises episodes globally since the mid-nineteenth century. This is a conclusion of the Spring 2021 Lebanon Economic Monitor (LEM) in which the Lebanon crisis is contrasted with the most severe global crises episodes as observed by Reinhart and Rogoff (2014) over the 1857–2013 period.
“In fact, Lebanon’s GDP plummeted from close to US$ 55 billion in 2018 to an estimated US$ 33 billion in 2020, with US$ GDP/capita falling by around 40 percent. Such a brutal and rapid contraction is usually associated with conflicts or wars.”
The Lebanon Poverty and Equity Assessment, produced by the World Bank in 2024, found the share of individuals in Lebanon living under the poverty line more than tripled, rising from 12 percent to 44 percent. The depth and severity of poverty also increased over the decade between 2012 and 2022.
To make matters worse, the port explosion destroyed Lebanon’s strategic wheat reserves at a time when the war in Ukraine drove significant increases in global food prices. Annual food inflation in Lebanon skyrocketed from 7.67 percent in January 2019 to a whopping 483.15 percent for the year ending in January 2022. While food inflation has since declined, it remains high, sitting just below 20 percent for the year ending September 2024. The World Bank said:
“The sharp deterioration of the Lebanese pound, which lost 98 percent of its pre-crisis value by December 2023, propelled inflation to new heights. With imports constituting about 60 percent of the consumption basket (World Bank, 2022), the plunging currency led to triple-digit inflation which rose steeply from an annual average of 3 percent between 2011 and 2018, to 85 percent in 2019, 155 percent in 2020, and 221 percent in 2023 . . .
“Faced with falling foreign exchange reserves, the government withdrew subsidies on medication, fuel, and wheat further fuelling rising costs of healthcare and transport (Figure 1.2). Rapid inflation acted effectively as a highly regressive tax, striking hardest at the poor and those with fixed, lira-denominated incomes.”
The ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy has amplified the power of Hezbollah, a paramilitary group formed in 1982 in response to Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon.
“Hezbollah is famous for entrenching its power in an elaborate social infrastructure of Islamic welfare. The social grip of those structures and services is increased by the ongoing crisis of the Lebanese economy. When the medical service fails, desperate families turn to the Hezbollah-run health service,” says Adam Tooze
As banks imposed capital controls, many Lebanese lost confidence in the financial system. The financial arm of Hezbollah, the al-Quad al-Hassan Association (AQAH), experienced a significant increase in clients, despite being subject to US Treasury sanctions since 2007.
The US accuses Hezbollah of using AQAH as a front to manage its financial activities. When a 28-year-old engineer, Hassan Shoumar, was locked out of his dollar accounts in late 2019, he redirected his money into his account at AQAH: “What I care about is that when I want my money, I can get it.”
While Hezbollah portrays itself as “the resistance”, as a member of the governing coalition in Lebanon, it also forms an influential part of the political elite. Adam Tooze gives an example of how the political elite is still looking after itself:
“[T]he Lebanese Parliament in a grotesque act of self-dealing in January 2024 passed a budget that promised to close the budget deficit of 12.8 of GDP by raising regressive value-added tax while decreasing the progressive taxes levied on capital gains, real estate and investments.
“For lack of reforms, the IMF [International Monetary Fund] is refusing to disburse any of the $3bn package that are allocated to Lebanon.”
While the protest movement called for a “technocratic” government in Lebanon, the experiences of Greece and other countries facing financial difficulties suggest such governments can pose their own risks, especially when they involve unelected “experts” in prominent positions.
One example is the political reaction to the counterproductive austerity programme imposed on Greece by the European Commission, European Central Bank and IMF in the aftermath of the 2007-2008 financial crisis. This demonstrates how the demands of international investors can conflict with the needs of the local population.
Lebanon carries more than its fair share of refugees Lebanon currently hosts the largest number of refugees per capita in the world, despite its scarce resources. This began as an overflow from the Syrian conflict in 2011, with nearly 1.2 million ‘displaced’ Syrians in Lebanon registered with UNHCR by May 2015.
When I visited Lebanon in 2015, I tried to grasp the scale of the refugee issue. In terms of population, Lebanon is comparable to New Zealand, with both countries having just over 5 million people.
I imagined what New Zealand would be like if it attempted to host a million refugees in addition to its general population. Yet in terms of land area Lebanon is only 10,400 square kilometres — about the size of New Zealand’s Marlborough region at the top of the South Island.
Now, imagine accommodating a population of over 5 million in such a small space, with more than a fifth of them being refugees.
While it was encouraging to see New Zealand increase its refugee quota to 1500 places in July 2020, we could afford to do much more in the current situation. This includes creating additional visa pathways for those fleeing Gaza and Lebanon.
#BREAKING
United States VETOES Security Council draft resolution that would have demanded an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, and the release of all hostages
On top of all that – Israeli attacks and illegal booby traps Since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and the ongoing Israeli invasion of Gaza, Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged fire across Lebanon’s southern border.
Israel makes much of the threat of rocket attacks on Israel from Hezbollah. However, data from US based non-profit organisation Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) shows Israel carried out 81 percent of the 10,214 attacks between between the two parties from October 7, 2023, and September 20, 2024.
These attacks resulted in 752 deaths in Lebanon, including 50 children. In contrast, Hezbollah’s attacks, largely centred on military targets, killed at least 33 Israelis.
Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
While the Israeli Defence Force (IDF) disputed these figures as an “oversimplification”, the IDF do not appear to dispute the reported number of Lebanese casualties. Hezbollah continues to offer an immediate ceasefire, so long as a ceasefire also applies to Gaza, but Israel has refused these terms.
In a further escalation, thousands of handheld pagers and walkie-talkies used in both civilian and military contexts in Lebanon and Syria suddenly exploded on September 17 and 18.
Israel attempted to deny responsibility, with Israeli President Isaac Herzog claiming he “rejects out of hand any connection” to the attack. However, 12 defence and intelligence officials, briefed on the attack, anonymously confirmed to The New York Times that Israel was behind the operation.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later boasted during a cabinet meeting that he had personally approved the pager attack. The New York Times described the aftermath:
“Powered by just a few ounces of an explosive compound concealed within the devices, the blasts sent grown men flying off motorcycles and slamming into walls, according to witnesses and video footage. People out shopping fell to the ground, writhing in agony, smoke snaking from their pockets.”
The exploding devices killed 42 people and injured more than 3500, with many victims losing one or both of their hands or eyes. At least four of the dead were children.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikatri called the explosions “a serious violation of Lebanese sovereignty and a crime by all standards”.
While around eight Hezbollah fighters were among the dead, most of those killed worked in administration roles and did not take partin hostilities. Under international humanitarian law targeting non-combatants is illegal.
Additionally, the UN Protocol on Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices also prohibits the use of “booby-traps or other devices in the form of apparently harmless portable objects which are specifically designed and constructed to contain explosive material”. Israel is a signatory to this UN Protocol.
Israel’s decision to turn ordinary consumer devices into illegal booby traps could backfire. While Israel frequently stresses the importance of its technology sector to its economy, who is going to buy technology associated with Israel now that the IDF have demonstrated its ability to indiscriminately weaponise consumer devices at any time?
International industry buyers will source elsewhere. Such a “silent boycott” could give greater momentum to the call from Palestinian civil society for boycotts, divestments and economic sanctions against Israel.
The booby trap pagers are also likely to affect the decisions of foreign airlines to service Israel on the grounds of safety. Since the war began in October 2023, the number of foreign airlines calling on Ben Gurion Airport in Israel has fallen significantly. Consequently, the cost of a round-trip ticket from the United States to Tel Aviv has risen sharply, from approximately $900 to $2500.
Israel targets civilian infrastructure in Lebanon Israel has also targeted civilian organisations linked to Hezbollah, such emergency services, hospitals and medical centres operated by the Islamic Health Society (IHS). Israel claims Hezbollah is “using the IHS as a cover for terrorist activities”. This apparently includes digging people out of buildings, as search and rescue teams have also been targeted and killed.
Israel accuses the microloan charity AQAH of funding “Hezbollah’s terror activities”, including purchasing weapons and making payments to Hezbollah fighters. On October 20, Israel attacked 30 branches of AQAH across Lebanon, drawing condemnation from both Amnesty International and the United Nations.
Ben Saul, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-terrorism maintains AQAH is not a lawful military target: “International humanitarian law does not permit attacks on the economic or financial infrastructure of an adversary, even if they indirectly sustain its military activities.”
Where the author ate his Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche, Beiruit. Image: Joe Hendren
On top of all that — an Israeli invasion In 1982, Israel attempted to use war to alter the political situation in Lebanon, with counterproductive results, including the creation of Hezbollah. In 2006, Hezbollah used the hilly terrain of southern Lebanon to beat Israel to a stalemate. Israel risks similar counterproductive outcomes again, at the cost of many more lives.
Yet on 1 October 2024, Israel launched a ground invasion of Lebanon, alongside strikes on Beirut, Sidon and border villages. The IDF confirmed the action on Twitter/X, promising a “limited, localised and targeted” operation against “Hezbollah terrorist targets” in southern Lebanon. One US official noted that Israel had framed its 1982 invasion as a limited incursion, which eventually turned into an 18-year occupation.
Israeli strikes have since expanded all over the country. According to figures provided by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Heath on November 13, Israel is responsible for the deaths of at least 3365 people in Lebanon, including 216 children and 192 health workers. More than 14,000 people have been wounded, and more than one million have been displaced from their homes.
Since September 30, 47 Israeli troops have been killed in combat in Southern Lebanon. Around 45 civilians in northern Israel have died due to rocket fire from Lebanon.
So, on top of an economic crisis, runaway inflation, unaffordable food, increasing poverty, the port explosion and covid-19, the Lebanese people now face a war that shows little signs of stopping.
Analysts suggest there is little chance of a ceasefire while Israel retains its “maximalist” demands, which include a full surrender of Hezbollah and allowing Israel to continue to attack targets in southern Lebanon.
A senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, Mohanad Hage Ali, believes Israel is feigning diplomacy to push the blame on Hezbollah. The best chance may come alongside a ceasefire in Gaza, but Israel shows little signs of negotiating meaningfully on that front either.
On September 26, the Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah BouHabib summarised the mood of the country in the wake of the pager attack:
“[N]obody expected the war to be taken in that direction. We Lebanese—we’ve had enough war. We’ve had fifteen years of war. . . .We’d like to live without war—happily, as a tourist country, a beautiful country, good food—and we are not able to do it. And so there is a lot of depression, especially with the latest escalation.”
In Aotearoa New Zealand, the Māori phrase “Kia kaha” means “stand strong”. If I could send a message from halfway across the world, it would be: “Kia kaha Lebanon. I look forward to the day I can visit you again, and munch on a yummy Za’atar man’ousheh while admiring the view from the beautiful Corniche Beirut.”
Joe Hendren holds a PhD in international business from the University of Auckland. He has more than 20 years of experience as a researcher, including work in the New Zealand Parliament, for trade unions and on various research projects. This is his first article for Asia Pacific Report. His blog can be found at http://joehendren.substack.com
Where I ate my Za’atar man’ousheh – Pigeon’s Rock, Corniche Beiruit
Myanmar military airstrikes in northern Shan state and Mandalay region have killed about 30 civilians over the past week, an insurgent spokeswoman and residents said, as the military intensifies its attacks in a bid to re-capture territory lost over the past year.
Ethnic minority guerrilla groups and their pro-democracy allies went on the offensive this time last year, achieving unprecedented gains against the military junta that seized power in an early 2021 coup and raising questions about the long-term sustainability of military rule.
But the military has said it is intent on recovering lost territory and anti-junta forces are expecting offensives as the army takes advantage of the dry season now beginning, when it can send its trucks along dried-out roads into remote, rebel-held areas.
At the same time, the air force is increasing its raids on areas under insurgent control.
A spokeswoman for the Shan state-based Ta’ang National Liberation Army, or TNLA, ethnic minority insurgent force said Kutkai town in northern
Shan state, about 260 kilometers (160 miles) northeast of the city of Mandalay, was among the towns hit hard in recent days.
“Since November 12, military council airstrikes have killed over 30 civilians and injured 46,” said Lway Yay Oo, spokesperson for the TNLA.
“More than 30 houses have been destroyed in the attacks. The military council has primarily targeted densely populated areas, including buildings such as shops where civilians tend to gather.”
RFA tried to contact the main military spokesman, Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun, but he did not answer his telephone.
Human rights groups and analysts say the Myanmar military has a long record of attacking civilians as part of its anti-insurgency strategy known as the “four cuts”, aimed at depriving rebel forces of food, funds, information and recruits.
But a former military officer and political analyst said it was inevitable that the military would use its air power and it was not deliberately targeting civilians.
“In war, unfortunately, casualties are inevitable. Cutting off the enemy’s communication lines is extremely challenging. The side with air superiority will naturally use it, that’s how it works… [but] we’ve never seen civilian casualties on this scale before,” said the analyst, who declined to be identified as talking to the media.
‘We’re not safe’
A Kutkai resident told Radio Free Asia that the air force dropped bombs near Yay Htwat Oo Garden Market and a church on Sunday night .
“A two-month-old baby, his mother and an elderly grandmother were killed instantly,” said the Kutkai resident, who declined to be identified because of security fears.
Ten people were wounded, seven of them critically, the resident said, adding: “The airstrike caused widespread destruction, with houses, shops and cars blown apart. The area targeted is densely populated.”
“We’ve dug bunkers, but by the time we hear the sound of planes and try to get to the bunker, the bombs have already fallen. How can we feel safe? No matter how much we try to protect ourselves, they are deliberately targeting us. We’re not safe,” said the Kutkai resident.
The TNLA-controlled towns of Nawnghkio and Mongngawt, in Shan state, and Mogoke, in the neighboring Mandalay region had also been attacked by the air force over the past week, residents there said.
Captain Zin Yaw, a former military officer who has joined the opposition, told RFA that the military has been relentlessly bombing areas controlled by allied insurgent forces to keep them on the back foot, while the army had set its sites on retaking the town of Lashio, which allied rebel fighters captured on Aug. 3 in one of their most significant victories.
“The military council is attempting to advance into Lashio from Mongyai and Tangyan,” said Zin Yaw. Mongyai is about 65 kilometers (40 miles) south of Lashio and Tangyan is about 85 kilometers (53 miles) m to the southeast.
“It appears they are trying to hinder the Kokang and Ta’ang forces from preparing for further military action, aiming to render them incapable of mounting an offensive,” he said, referring to another rebel force, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army, or MNDAA, by the name of the Kokang region where it is based. The MNDAA holds Lashio.
An alleged plot involving firearms and threatening the life of New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens when held hostage in Papua this year is being investigated by the Australian Federal Police.
The case involves “advancing a political cause by the separation of West Papua from Indonesia . . . with the intention of coercing by intimidation the governments of New Zealand and Indonesia”.
Named in the AFP search warrant seen by MWM is research scholar Julian King, 63, who has studied and written extensively about West Papuan affairs.
He has told others his home in Coffs Harbour, Queensland, was raided violently earlier this month by police using a stun grenade and smashing a door.
During the search, the police seized phones, computers and documents about alleged contacts with the West Papua rebel group Organisasi Papua Merdeka, OPM (Free Papua Organisation) and a bid to seek weapons and ammunition.
However, no arrests are understood to have been made or charges laid.
King, a former geologist and now a PhD student at Wollongong University, has been studying Papuan reaction to the Indonesian takeover since 1963. He has written in a research paper titled “A soul divided: The UN’s misconduct over West Papua” that West Papuans:
‘live under a military dictatorship described by legal scholars and human rights advocates as systemic terror and alleged genocide.’
Also named in the warrant alongside King is Amatus Dounemee Douw, confirmed by MWM contacts to be Australian citizen Akouboo Amatus Douw, who chairs the West Papua Diplomatic and Foreign Affairs Council, an NGO that states it seeks to settle disputes peacefully.
Risk to Australia-Indonesia relations The allegations threaten to fragment relations between Indonesia and Australia.
It is widely believed that human rights activists and church organisations are helping Papuan dissidents despite Canberra’s regular insistence that it officially backs Jakarta.
Earlier this year, Deputy PM Richard Marles publicly stressed: “We, Australia, fully recognise Indonesia’s territorial sovereignty. We do not endorse any independence movement.”
When seized by armed OPM pro-independence fighters in February last year, Mehrtens was flying a light plane for an Indonesian transport company.
He was released unharmed in September after being held for 593 days by the West Papua National Liberation Army (Tentara Pembebasan Nasional Papua Barat – TPNPB), the military wing of the OPM.
AFP is investigating alleged firearms plot which threatened the life of New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens when held hostage in West Papua this year #auspolhttps://t.co/8ZXFIB1fre
Designated ‘terrorist’ group, journalists banned OPM is designated as a terrorist organisation in Indonesia but isn’t on the Australian list of proscribed groups. Jakarta bans foreign journalists from Papua, so little impartial information is reported.
After Mehrtens was freed, TPNPB spokesman Sebby Sambom alleged that a local politician had paid a bribe, a charge denied by the NZ government.
However, West Papua Action Aotearoa spokesperson Catherine Delahunty told Radio NZ the bribe was “an internal political situation that has nothing to do with our government’s negotiations.”
Sambom, who has spent time in Indonesian jails for taking part in demonstrations, now operates out of adjacent Papua New Guinea — a separate independent country.
Australia was largely absent from the talks to free Mehrtens that were handled by NZ diplomats and the Indonesian military. The AFP’s current involvement raises the worry that information garnered under the search warrants will show the Indonesian government where the Kiwi was hidden so that locations can be attacked from the air.
At one stage during his captivity, Mehrtens appealed to the Indonesian military not to bomb villages.
It is believed Mehrtens was held in Nduga, a district with the lowest development index in the Republic, a measure of how citizens can access education, health, and income. Yet Papua is the richest province in the archipelago — the Grasberg mine is the world’s biggest deposit of gold and copper.
OPM was founded in December 1963 as a spiritual movement rejecting development while blending traditional and Christian beliefs. It then started working with international human rights agencies for support.
Indigenous Papuans are mainly Christian, while almost 90 percent of Indonesians follow Islam.
Chief independence lobbyist Benny Wenda lives in exile in Oxford. In 2003 he was given political asylum by the UK government after fleeing from an Indonesian jail. He has addressed the UN and European and British Parliaments, but Jakarta has so far resisted international pressure to allow any form of self-determination.
Questions for new President Prabowo Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto is in the UK this week, where Papuans have been drumming up opposition to the official visit. In a statement, Wenda said:
‘Prabowo has also restarted the transmigration settlement programme that has made us a minority in our own land.’
“For West Papuans, the ghost of (second president) Suharto has returned — (his) New Order regime still exists, it has just changed its clothes.”
Pleas for recognition of Papuan’s concerns get minimal backing in Indonesia; fears of balkanisation and Western nations taking over a splintered country are well entrenched in the 17,000-island archipelago of 1300 ethnic groups where “unity” is considered the Republic’s foundation stone.
Duncan Graham has a Walkley Award, two Human Rights Commission awards and other prizes for his radio, TV and print journalism in Australia. He now lives in Indonesia. He has been an occasional contributor to Asia Pacific Report and this article was first published by Michael West Media.
A federal jury in Virginia has ordered the U.S. military contractor CACI Premier Technology to pay a total of $42 million to three Iraqi men who were tortured at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison. The landmark verdict comes after 16 years of litigation and marks the first time a civilian contractor has been found legally responsible for the gruesome abuses at Abu Ghraib. We discuss the case and its significance for human rights with Baher Azmy, the legal director for the Center for Constitutional Rights, which represented the Abu Ghraib survivors. “This lawsuit has been about justice and accountability for three Iraqi men — our clients, Salah, Suhail and Asa’ad — who exhibited just awe-inspiring courage and resilience,” he says.
This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.
An exiled West Papuan leader has called on supporters globally to show their support by raising the Morning Star flag — banned by Indonesia — on December 1.
“Whether in your house, your workplace, the beach, the mountains or anywhere else, please raise our flag and send us a picture,” said United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) interim president Benny Wenda.
“By doing so, you give West Papuans strength and courage and show us we are not alone.”
The plea came in response to a dramatic step-up in military reinforcements for the Melanesian region by new President Prabowo Subianto, who was inaugurated last month, in an apparent signal for a new crackdown on colonised Papuans.
“The situation in occupied West Papua is on a knife edge,” said the UK-based Wenda in a statement on the ULMWP website.
He added that President Prabowo had announced the return of a “genocidal transmigration settlement policy”.
Indigenous people a minority
“From the 1970s, transmigration brought hundreds of thousands of Javanese settlers into West Papua, ultimately making the Indigenous people a minority in our own land,” Wenda said.
“At the same time, Prabowo [is sending] thousands of soldiers to Merauke to safeguard the destruction of our ancestral forest for a set of gigantic ecocidal developments.
“Five million hectares of Papuan forest are set to be ripped down for sugarcane and rice plantations.
“West Papuans are resisting Prabowo’s plan to wipe us out, but we need all our supporters to stand beside us as we battle this terrifying new threat.”
The Morning Star is illegal in West Papua and frequently protesters who have breached this law have faced heavy jail sentences.
“If we raise [the flag], paint it on our faces, draw it on a banner, or even wear its colours on a bracelet, we can face up to 15 or 20 years in prison.
“This is why we need people to fly the flag for us. As ever, we will be proudly flying the Morning Star above Oxford Town Hall. But we want to see our supporters hold flag raisings everywhere — on every continent.
‘Inhabiting our struggle’
“Whenever you raise the flag, you are inhabiting the spirit of our struggle.”
Wenda appealed to everyone in West Papua — “whether you are in the cities, the villages, or living as a refugee or fighter in the bush” — to make December 1 a day of prayer and reflection on the struggle.
“We remember our ancestors and those who have been killed by the Indonesian coloniser, and strengthen our resolve to carry on fighting for Merdeka — our independence.”
Wenda said the peaceful struggle was making “great strides forward” with a constitution, a cabinet operating on the ground, and a provisional government with a people’s mandate.
“We know that one day soon the Morning Star will fly freely in our West Papuan homeland,” he said.
“But for now, West Papuans risk arrest and imprisonment if we wave our national flag. We need our supporters around the world to fly it for us, as we look forward to a Free West Papua.”
The series was assisted by Pacific journalist David Robie, author of Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior; and editor Giff Johnson, Eve Burns and Hilary Hosia of the Marshall Islands Journal; along with many Marshall Islanders who spoke to the podcast crew or helped with this project.
Qatar’s Foreign Ministry has rejected media reports that it has pulled out of mediation efforts between Israel and Hamas but added that it has “stalled” its efforts until all parties show “willingness and seriousness” to end the war.
News of the suspension comes as Gaza marks 400 days of war with more than 43,000 Palestinians being killed, 102,000 wounded and 10,000 missing.
The death toll includes at least 17,385 children, including 825 children below the age of one, and nearly 12,000 women.
In a statement on X, the ministry spokesperson Majed al-Ansari said Qatar had informed the relevant mediation parties 10 days ago of its intentions.
Al-Ansari also said that reports regarding the Hamas political office in Doha were inaccurate, “stating that the main goal of the of the office in Qatar is to be a channel of communication between the concerned parties”.
— Ministry of Foreign Affairs – Qatar (@MofaQatar_EN) November 9, 2024
Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson also said that the country would not accept that its role as a mediator be used to “blackmail it”.
“Qatar will not accept that mediation be a reason for blackmailing it, as we have witnessed manipulation since the collapse of the first pause and the women and children exchange deal, especially in retreating from obligations agreed upon through mediation, and exploiting the continuation of negotiations to justify the continuation of the war to serve narrow political purposes,” he said in the statement posted on X.
Criticism aimed at Israel
Commentators on Al Jazeera pointed to the criticism being primarily aimed at Israel and the US.
Senior political analyst Marwan Bishara said Qatar had been spearheading the attempt at reaching a ceasefire “for so long now”.
“Clearly, there have been attempts by a number of parties, notably the Israelis, to undermine the process or abuse the process of diplomacy in order to continue the war.”
400 days of genocide in Gaza . . . reportage by Al Jazeera, banned in Israel. Image: AJ screenshot APR
Earlier, Cindy McCain, executive director of the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP), said immediate steps must be taken to prevent an “all-out catastrophe” in northern Gaza where Israeli forces have maintained a monthlong siege on as many as 95,000 civilian residents amid its brutal military offensive in the area.
‘Unacceptable’ famine crisis
“The unacceptable is confirmed: Famine is likely happening in north Gaza,” McCain wrote on social media.
Steps must be taken immediately, McCain said, to allow the “safe, rapid [and] unimpeded flow of humanitarian [and] commercial supplies” to reach the besieged population in the north of the war-torn territory.
A “Teachers for free Palestine” placard at Saturday’s solidarity rally for Palestine in Auckland. Image: David Robie/APR
World Health Organisation Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has added his voice to rising concerns, saying on social media it was: “Deeply alarming.”
A group of global food security experts has reported that famine is likely “imminent within the northern Gaza Strip”.
Meanwhile, more than 50 countries have signed a letter urging the UN Security Council and General Assembly to take immediate steps to halt arms sales to Israel.
The letter accuses the Israeli government of not doing enough to protect the lives of civilians during its assault on Gaza, reports Al Jazeera.
A protester with the Turkish flag at Saturday’s Palestine and Lebanon solidarity rally in Auckland as demonstrations continued around the world. Image: APR
The Enemy Within, by Maire Leadbeater is many things. It is:
• A family history
• A social history
• A history of the left-wing in Aotearoa
• A chilling reminder of the origin and continuation of the surveillance state in New Zealand, and
• A damn good read.
The book is a great example of citizen or activist authorship. The author, Maire Leadbeater, and her family are front and centre of the dark cloud of the surveillance state that has hung and still hangs over New Zealand’s “democracy”.
What better place to begin the book than the author noting that she had been spied on by the security services from the age of 10. What better place to begin than describing the role of the Locke family — Elsie, Jack, Maire, Keith and their siblings — have played in Aotearoa society over the last few decades.
And what a fitting way to end the book than with the final chapter entitled, “Person of Interest: Keith Locke”; Maire’s much-loved brother and our much-loved friend and comrade.
In between these pages is a treasure trove of commentary and stories of the development of the surveillance state in the settler colony of NZ and the impact that this has had on the lives of ordinary — no, extra-ordinary — people within this country.
The book could almost be described as a political romp from the settler colonisation of New Zealand through the growth of the workers movement and socialist and communist ideology from the late 1800s until today.
I have often deprecatingly called myself a mere footnote of history as that is all I seem to appear as in many books written about recent progressive history in New Zealand. But it was without false modesty that when Maire gave me a copy of the book a couple of weeks back, I immediately went to the index, looked up my name and found that this time I was a bit more than a footnote, but had a section of a chapter written on my interaction with the spooks.
But it was after reading this, dipping into a couple of other “person of interest” stories of people I knew such as Keith, Mike Treen, the Rosenbergs, Murray Horton and then starting the book again from the beginning did it become clear on what issues the state was paranoid about that led it to build an apparatus to spy on its own citizens.
These were issues of peace, anti-conscription, anti-nuclear, de-colonisation, unemployed workers and left trade unionism and socialist and communist thought. These are the issues that come up time and time again; essentially it was seditious or subversive to be part of any of these campaigns or ideologies.
Client state spying
The other common theme through the book is the role that the UK and more latterly the US has played in ensuring that their NZ client settler state plays by their rules, makes enemies of their enemies and spies on its own people for their “benefit”.
Trade unionist and activist Robert Reid . . . “The book could almost be described as a political romp from the settler colonisation of New Zealand through the growth of the workers movement and socialist and communist ideology from the late 1800s until today.” Image: David Robie/Asia Pacific Report
It was interesting to read how the “5 Eyes”, although not using that name, has been in operation as long as NZ has had a spying apparatus. In fact, the book shows that 3 of the 5 eyes forced NZ to establish its surveillance apparatus in the first place.
Maire, and her editor have arranged this book in a very reader friendly way. It is mostly chronological showing the rise of the surveillance state from the beginning of the 19th century, in dispersed with a series of vignettes of “Persons of Interest”.
Maire would probably acknowledge that this book could not have been written without the decision of the SIS to start releasing files (all beit they were heavily redacted with many missing parts) of many of us who have been spied on by the SIS over the years. So, on behalf of Maire, thank you SIS.
Maire has painstakingly gone through pages and pages of these primary source files and incorporated them into the historical narrative of the book showing what was happening in society while this surveillance was taking place.
I was especially delighted to read the history of the anti-war and conscientious objectors movement. Two years ago, almost to the day, we held the 50th anniversary of the Organisation to Halt Military Service (OHMS); an organisation that I founded and was under heavy surveillance in 1972.
We knew a bit about previous anti-conscription struggles but Maire has provided much more context and information that we knew. It was good to read about people like John Charters, Ormand Burton and Archie Barrington as well more known resisters such as my great uncle Archibald Baxter.
Within living memory
Many of the events covered take place within my living memory. But it was wonderful to be reminded of some things I had forgotten about or to find some new gems of information about our past.
Stories around Bill Sutch, Shirley Smith, Ann and Wolfgang Rosenberg, Jack and Mary Woodward, Gerald O’Brien, Allan Brash (yes, Don’s dad), Cecil Holmes, Jack Lewin are documented as well as my contemporaries such as Don Carson, David Small, Aziz Choudry, Trevor Richards, Jane Kelsey, Nicky Hager, Owen Wilkes, Tame Iti in addition to Maire, Keith and Mike Treen.
The book finishes with a more recent history of NZ again aping the US’s so-called war on terror with the introduction of an anti and counter-terrorism mandate for the SIS and its sister agencies
The book traverses events such as the detention of Ahmed Zaoui, the raid on the Kim Dotcom mansion, the privatisation of spying to firms such as Thomson and Clark, the Urewera raids, “Hit and Run” in Afghanistan. Missing the cut was the recent police raid and removal of the computer of octogenarian, Peter Wilson for holding money earmarked for a development project in DPRK (North Korea).
When we come to the end of the book we are reminded of the horrific Christchurch mosque attack and massacre and prior to that of the bombing of Wellington Trades Hall and the Rainbow Warrior. Also, the failure of the SIS to discover Mossad agents operating in NZ on fake passports.
We cannot but ask the question of why multi-millions of dollars have been spent spying on, surveilling and monitoring peace activists, trade unionists, communists, Māori and more latterly Muslims, when the terrorism that NZ has faced has been that perpetrated on these people not by these people.
Maire notes in the book that the SIS budget for 2021 was around $100 million with around 400 FTEs employed. This does not include GCSB or other parts of the security apparatus.
Seeking subversives in wrong places
This level of money has been spent for well over 100 years looking for subversives and terrorists in the wrong place!
Finally, although dealing with the human cost of the surveillance state, the book touches on some of the lighter sides of the SIS spying. Those of us under surveillance in the 1970s and 1980s remember the amateurish phone tapping that went on at that time.
Also, the men in cars with cameras sitting outside our flats for days on end. Not in the book, but I have one memory of such a man with a camera in a car outside our flat in Wallace Street, Wellington.
After a few days some of my flatmates took pity on him and made him a batch of scones which they passed through the window of his car. He stayed for a bit longer that day but we never saw him or an alternate again.
Another issue the book picks up is the obsession that the SIS and its foreign counterparts had with counting communists in NZ. I remember that the CIA used to put out a Communist Yearbook that described and attempted to count how many members were in each of the communist parties all around the world.
In NZ, my party, the Workers Communist League, was smaller than the SUP, CPNZ and SAL, but one year near the end of our existence we were pleasantly surprised to see that the CIA had almost to a person, doubled our membership.
We could not work out why, until we realised that we all had code names as well as real names and we were getting more and more slack at using the correct one in the correct place. Anyone surveilling us, counting names, would have counted double the names that we had as members! We took the compliment.
Thank you, Maire, for this great book. Thank you and your family for your great contribution to Aotearoa society.
Hopefully the hardships and human cost that you have shown in this book will commit or recommit the rest of us to struggle for a decolonised and socialist Aotearoa within a peaceful and multi-polar world.
And as one of Jack Locke’s political guides said: “the road may be long and torturous, but the future is bright.”
Robert Reid has more than 40 years’ experience in trade unions and in community employment development in Aotearoa New Zealand. He is a former general secretary the president of FIRST Union. Much of his work has been with disadvantaged groups and this has included work with Māori, Pacific peoples and migrant communities. This was his address tonight for the launch of The Enemy Within: The Human Cost of State Surveillance in Aotearoa New Zealand, by Maire Leadbeater.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, “War, Peace and the Presidency.” I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: As we continue to look at Donald Trump’s return to the White House, we turn now to look at what it means for the world, from Israel’s war on Gaza to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. During his victory speech, Trump vowed that he was going to “stop wars”.
But what will Trump’s foreign policy actually look like?
AMY GOODMAN: We’re joined now by Fatima Bhutto, award-winning author of several works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Runaways, New Kings of the World. She is co-editing a book along with Sonia Faleiro titled Gaza: The Story of a Genocide, due out next year. She writes a monthly column for Zeteo.
Start off by just responding to Trump’s runaway victory across the United States, Fatima.
Fatima Bhutto on the Kamala Harris “support for genocide”. Video: Democracy Now!
FATIMA BHUTTO: Well, Amy, I don’t think it’s an aberration that he won. I think it’s an aberration that he lost in 2020. And I think anyone looking at the American elections for the last year, even longer, could see very clearly that the Democrats were speaking to — I’m not sure who, to a hall of mirrors.
They ran an incredibly weak and actually macabre campaign, to see Kamala Harris describe her politics as one of joy as she promised the most lethal military in the world, talking about women’s rights in America, essentially focusing those rights on the right to termination, while the rest of the world has watched women slaughtered in Gaza for 13 months straight.
You know, it’s very curious to think that they thought a winning strategy was Beyoncé and that Taylor Swift was somehow a political winning strategy that was going to defeat — who? — Trump, who was speaking to people, who was speaking against wars. You know, whether we believe him or not, it was a marked difference from what Kamala Harris was saying and was not saying.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Fatima, you wrote a piece for Zeteo earlier this year titled “Gaza Has Exposed the Shameful Hypocrisy of Western Feminism.” So, you just mentioned the irony of Kamala Harris as, you know, the second presidential candidate who is a woman, where so much of the campaign was about women, and the fact that — you know, of what’s been unfolding on women, against women and children in Gaza for the last year. If you could elaborate?
FATIMA BHUTTO: Yeah, we’ve seen, Nermeen, over the last year, you know, 70 percent of those slaughtered in Gaza by Israel and, let’s also be clear, by America, because it’s American bombs and American diplomatic cover that allows this slaughter to continue unabated — 70 percent of those victims are women and children.
We have watched children with their heads blown off. We have watched children with no surviving family members find themselves in hospital with limbs missing. Gaza has the largest cohort of child amputees in the world. And we have seen newborns left to die as Israel switches off electricity and fuel of hospitals.
So, for Kamala Harris to come out and talk repeatedly about abortion, and I say this as someone who is pro-choice, who has always been pro-choice, was not just macabre, but it’s obscene. It’s an absolute betrayal of feminism, because feminism is about liberation. It’s not about termination.
And it’s about protecting women at their most vulnerable and at their most frightened. And there was no sign of that. You know, we also saw Kamala Harris bring out celebrities. I mean, the utter vacuousness of bringing out Jennifer Lopez, Beyoncé and others to talk about being a mother, while mothers are being widowed, are being orphaned in Gaza, it was not just tone deaf, it seemed to have a certain hostility, a certain contempt for the suffering that the rest of us have been watching.
I’d also like to add a point about toxic masculinity. There was so much toxicity in Kamala Harris’s campaign. You know, I watched her laugh with Oprah as she spoke about shooting someone who might enter her house with a gun, and giggling and saying her PR team may not like that, but she would kill them.
You don’t need to be a man to practice toxic masculinity, and you don’t need to be white to practice white supremacy, as we’ve seen very clearly from this election cycle.
AMY GOODMAN: And yet, Fatima Bhutto, if you look at what Trump represented, and certainly the Muslim American community, the Arab American community, Jewish progressives, young people, African-Americans certainly understood what Trump’s policy was when he was president.
And it’s rare, you know, a president comes back to serve again after a term away. It’s only happened once before in history.
But you have, for example, Trump moving the US Embassy to Jerusalem. You have an illegal settlement named after Trump in the West Bank. The whole question of Netanyahu and his right-wing allies in Israel pushing for annexation of the West Bank, where Trump would stand on this.
And, of course, you have the Abraham Accords, which many Palestinians felt left them out completely. If you can talk about this? These were put forward by Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, who, when the massive Gaza destruction was at its height, talked about Gaza as waterfront real estate.
FATIMA BHUTTO: Absolutely. There’s no question that Trump has been a malign force, not just when it concerns Palestinians, but, frankly, out in the world. But I would argue there’s not very much difference between what these two administrations or parties do. The difference is that Trump doesn’t have the gloss and the charisma of an Obama or — I mean, I can’t even say that Biden has charisma, but certainly the gloss.
Trump says it. They do it. The difference — I can’t really tell the difference anymore.
We saw the Biden administration send over 500 shipments of arms to Israel, betraying America’s own laws, the fact that they are not allowed to export weapons of war to a country committing gross violations of human rights. We saw Bill Clinton trotted out in Michigan to tell Muslims that, actually, they should stop killing Israelis and that Jews were there before them.
I mean, it was an utterly contemptuous speech. So, what is the difference exactly?
We saw Bernie Sanders, who was mentioned earlier, write an op-ed in The Guardian in the days before the election, warning people that if they were not to vote for Kamala Harris, if Donald Trump was to get in, think about the climate crisis. Well, we have watched Israel’s emissions in the first five months of their deadly attack on Gaza release more planet-warming gases into the atmosphere than 20 of the world’s most climate-vulnerable nations release in a year.
So, I don’t quite see that there’s a difference between what Democrats allow and what Trump brags about. I think it’s just a question of crudeness and decorum and politeness. One has it, and one doesn’t. In a sense, Trump is much clearer for the rest of the world, because he says what he’s going to do, and, you know, you take him at his word, whereas we have been gaslit and lied to by Antony Blinken on a daily basis now since October 7th.
Every time that AOC or Kamala Harris spoke about fighting desperately for a ceasefire, we saw more carnage, more massacres and Israel committing crimes with total impunity. You know, it wasn’t under Trump that Israel has killed more journalists than have ever been killed in any recorded conflict. It’s under Biden that Israel has killed more UN workers than have ever been killed in the UN’s history. So, I’m not sure there’s a difference.
And, you know, we’ll have to wait to see in the months ahead. But I don’t think anyone is bracing for an upturn. Certainly, people didn’t vote for Kamala Harris. I’m not sure they voted for Trump. We know that she lost 14 million votes from Biden’s win in 2020. And we know that those votes just didn’t come out for the Democrats. Some may have migrated to Trump. Some may have gone to third parties. But 14 million just didn’t go anywhere.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: So, Fatima, if you could, you know, tell us what do you think the reasons are for that? I mean, the kind of — as you said, because it is really horrifying, what has unfolded in Gaza in the last 13 months. You’ve written about this. You now have an edited anthology that you’re editing, co-editing. You know, what do you think accounts for this, the sheer disregard for the lives of tens of thousands of Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza?
FATIMA BHUTTO: It’s a total racism on the part not just of America, but I’m speaking of the West here. This has been betrayed over the last year, the fact that Ukraine is spoken about with an admiration, you know, Zelensky is spoken about with a sort of hero worship, Ukrainian resisters to Russia’s invasion are valorised.
You know, Nancy Pelosi wore a bracelet of bullets used by the Ukrainian resistance against Trump [sic]. But Palestinians are painted as terrorists, are dehumanised to such an extent. You know, we saw that dehumanisation from the mouths of Bill Clinton no less, from the mouths of Kamala Harris, who interrupted somebody speaking out against the genocide, and saying, “I am speaking.”
What is more toxically masculine than that?
We’ve also seen a concerted crackdown in universities across the United States on college students. I’m speaking also here of my own alma mater of Columbia University, of Barnard College, that called the NYPD, who fired live ammunition at the students. You know, this didn’t happen — this extreme response didn’t happen in protests against apartheid. It didn’t happen in protests against Vietnam in quite the same way.
And all I can think is, America and the West, who have been fighting Muslim countries for the last 25, 30 years, see that as acceptable to do so. Our deaths are acceptable to them, and genocide is not a red line.
And, you know, to go back to what what was mentioned earlier about the working class, that is absolutely ignored in America — and I would make the argument across the West, too — they have watched administration after, you know, president and congressmen give billions and billions of dollars to Ukraine, while they have no relief at home.
They have no relief from debt. They have no relief from student debt. They have no medical care, no coverage. They’re struggling to survive. And this is across the board. And after Ukraine, they saw billions go to Israel in the same way, while they get, frankly, nothing.
AMY GOODMAN: Fatima Bhutto, we want to thank you so much for being with us, award-winning author of a number of works of fiction and nonfiction, including The Runaways and New Kings of the World, co-editing a book called Gaza: The Story of a Genocide, due out next year, writes a monthly column for Zeteo.
Coming up, we look at Trump’s vow to deport as many as 20 million immigrants and JD Vance saying, yes, US children born of immigrant parents could also be deported.
Despite being appalled at my government, I winced as a New Zealander to hear my country described as part of the “Axis of Genocide”. With increasing frequency I hear commentators on West Asia/Middle East news sites hold the collective West responsible for the genocide.
It’s a big come-down from the Global Labrador Puppy status New Zealand enjoyed recently.
Australia too has a record of being viewed as a country with soft-power influence, albeit while a stalwart deputy to the US in this part of the world. That is over.
Professor Mohammad Seyed Marandi talks to Piers Morgan Uncensored. Video: Middle East Eye
Regrettably, Australia and New Zealand have sent troops to support US-Israel in the Red Sea (killing Yemeni people), failed to join the International Court of Justice (ICJ) case against Israel, shared intelligence with the Israelis, trained with their forces, provided R&R to soldiers fresh from the killing fields of Gaza while blocking Palestinian refugees, and extended valuable diplomatic support to Israel at the UN.
British planes overfly Gaza to provide data, a German freighter arrived in Alexandria this week laden with hundreds of thousands of kilograms of explosives to kill yet more Palestinian civilians.
Genocide is a collective effort of the Collective West.
Australia and New Zealand, along with the rest of the West, “will stand by the Israeli regime until they exterminate the last Palestinian”, says Professor Mohammad Seyed Marandi, an American-Iranian academic. What our governments do is at best “light condemnation” he says, but when it counts they will be silent.
‘They will allow extermination’
“They will allow the extermination of the people of Gaza. And then if the Israelis go after the West Bank, they will allow for that to happen as well. Under no circumstances do I see the West blocking extermination,” Marandi says.
Looking at our performance over the past seven decades and what is happening today, it is an assessment I would not argue against.
But why should we listen to someone from the Islamic Republic of Iran, you might ask. Who are they to preach at us?
I see things differently. In our dystopian, tightly-curated mainstream mediascape it is rare to hear an Iranian voice. We need to listen to more people, not fewer.
I’m definitely not a cheerleader for Iran or any state and I most certainly don’t agree with everything Professor Marandi says but he gives me richer insights than me just drowning in the endless propaganda of Tier One war criminals like Joe Biden, Benjamin Netanyahu, Antony Blinken and their spokespeople.
Dr Marandi, professor of English literature and orientalism at the University of Tehran, is a former member of Iran’s negotiating team that brokered the break-through JCPOA nuclear agreement (later reneged on by the Trump and Biden administrations).
He is no shrinking violet. He has that fierceness of someone who has been shot at multiple times. A veteran of the Iran-Iraq War, Marandi was wounded four times, including twice with chemical weapons, key components of which were likely supplied by the US to their erstwhile ally Saddam Hussein.
Killed people he knew
Dr Marandi was in South Beirut a few weeks ago when the US-Israelis dropped dozens of bombs on residential buildings killing hundreds of civilians to get at the leader of Hezbollah (a textbook war crime that will never be prosecuted). It killed people he knew. To a BBC reporter who said, yes, but they were targeting Hezbollah, he replied:
“That’s like saying of 7/7 [the terror bombings in London]: ‘They bombed a British regime stronghold.’ How would that sound to people in the UK?”
Part of what people find discomforting about Dr Marandi is that he tears down the thin curtain that separates the centres of power from the major news outlets that repeat their talking points (“Israel has a legitimate right to self-defence” etc).
The more our leaders and media prattle on about Israel’s right to defend itself, the more we sound like the Germany that terrorised Europe in the 1930s and 40s. And the rest of the world has noticed.
As TS Eliot said: “Nothing dies harder than the desire to think well of oneself.”
Not a man to mince words when it comes to war crimes.
Masterful over pointing out racism
Dr Marandi has been masterful at pointing out the racism inherent in the Western worldview, the chauvinism that allows Western minds to treasure white lives but discount as worthless hundreds of thousands of Muslim lives taken in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen and elsewhere.
“There is no reason to expect that a declining and desperate empire will conduct itself in a civilised manner. Iran is prepared for the worst,” he says.
“In this great moral struggle, in the world that we live in today — meaning the holocaust in Gaza — who is defending the people of Gaza and who is supporting the holocaust? Iran with its small group of allies is alone against the West,” he told Nima Alkhorshid from Dialogue Works recently.
The Collective West shares collective responsibility.
Dr Marandi draws a sharp distinction between our governments and our populations. He is entirely right in pointing out that the younger people are, in countries like Australia and New Zealand, the more likely they are to oppose the genocide — as do growing numbers of young Jewish Americans who have rejected the Zionist project.
“All people within the whole of Palestine must be equal — Jews, Muslims and Christians. The Islamic Republic of Iran will not allow the US, EU, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the Zionist regime to exterminate the Palestinians of Gaza.”
I heard Mohammad Seyed Marandi extend an interesting invitation to us all in a recent interview. He said the “Axis of Resistance” should be thought of as open to all people who oppose the genocide in Gaza and who are opposed to continued Western militarism in West Asia.
I would never sign up to the policies of Iran, especially on issues like women’s rights, but I do find the invitation to a broad coalition clarifying: the Axis of Genocide versus The Axis of Resistance. Whose side are you on?
Eugene Doyle is a community organiser and activist in Wellington, New Zealand. He received an Absolutely Positively Wellingtonian award in 2023 for community service. His first demonstration was at the age of 12 against the Vietnam War. This article was first published at his public policy website Solidarity and is republished here with permission.
Michael West (@MichaelWestBiz) 
