France’s naval flagship, the 261m aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, is to be deployed to the Pacific later this year, as part of an exercise codenamed “Clémenceau 25”.
French Naval Command Etat-Major’s Commodore Jacques Mallard told a French media briefing that the main objective of the planned exercise, labelled a “high-level strategic posture”, was to boost aero naval “interoperability”, as well as information and intelligence sharing.
The exact date of the 2025 deployment has not yet been disclosed, even though Commodore Mallard said last November it would be “very soon”.
Clémenceau 25, spanning over “almost four months”, would fall under an international 20-year Strategic Interoperability Framework signed between French and US naval forces in 2021.
Apart from the US Navy’s Seventh Fleet, the Royal Australian Navy and Japan’s Japan Maritime Self-Defence Force are also part of the deployment.
France’s main naval bases in the Pacific are located in French Polynesia — Pacific naval command, ALPACI — and New Caledonia.
As part of its Indo-Pacific strategy, France also intends to show it has the capacity to deploy significant means — including the 42,000-tonne aircraft carrier — in the most distant regions, including the Pacific.
“To deploy a significant naval force in an area which, during the next 10 years, will be the transit point for more than 40 percent of the world’s Gross Domestic Product, shows France’s interest in this area,” Mallard told French media.
“The roadmap, with our regional partners, is to foster a free, open and stable Indo-Pacific space within the framework of international law, and to contribute to the protection of our populations and our interests.”
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
A Palestine solidarity advocate today appealed to New Zealanders to shed their feelings of powerlessness over the Gaza genocide and “take action” in support of an effective global strategy of boycott, divestment and sanctions.
“Many of us have become addicted to ‘doom scrolling’ — reading or watching more and more articles on what is happening in Palestine,” Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa (PSNA) national chair Neil Scott told supporters in Auckland’s Te Komititanga Square.
“Then becoming depressed because we have watched it month after month without feeling we can do anything about it.”
The news over the 15-month war was depressing daily as the “official” death toll in Gaza from Israel’s war in the besieged enclave topped 46,000 this week, mostly women and children, and Israeli raids on neighbouring Lebanon in breach of the ceasefire and also on Yemen continued unabated.
The medical research journal Lancet also reported yesterday that the real death toll had been underreported and it was 40 percent higher with an estimated 64,200 killed in the first nine months of the war ending June 30.
PSNA national secretary Neil Scott . . . “When we do nothing in the face of the genocide we see going on in Gaza, that causes us to be stressed and be uncomfortable.” Image: APR
“If you’re like me, you will be scrolling around the available information sources finding out the truth about the crimes against humanity of apartheid and genocide that the Israeli military and the illegal settlers are doing,” Scott said.
“Along with this, we’re all feeling disgusted at the lack of action by the government.
“Who feels helpless about what is happening and feel as if they can’t do much about it? A common feeling,” he admitted.
Action good for health
Scott said there was evidence that taking some action was actually good for people’s mental health. Feeling helpless added to “the stress we feel”.
“There is a concept of ‘Bearing Witness’ — this is about exposing ourselves to the suffering of the Palestinians.
“It basically means being aware of those abuses. Something I think we all do.
“Then there is ‘Taking Action’ — this is about participating in a tangible way to try to help alleviate or prevent the suffering we witness the Palestinians living through.
Lancet study: Gaza toll 40% higher. Video: TRT News
“When we do nothing in the face of the genocide we see going on in Gaza, that causes us to be stressed and be uncomfortable.
“But we, as individuals, can do something.
“All human rights activists, unless we are absolutely overwhelmed at the moment, should probably spend a couple of hours a week taking action. Not all in one go but spread throughout the week.
Using ‘doom scrolling’ energy
“We can do something with all that doom scrolling stress or energy.
“We can turn it into taking action.”
PSNA’s Neil Scott speaking at the BDS rally today. Image: APR
Protesters have embarked on a three-week cycle addressing the global BDS Movement’s strategy of “boycott, divest and sanctions” in support of Palestine’s right to be a state while still seeking a ceasefire. Boycott was today’s theme.
Tasneem Gouda addressing the BDS rally today. Video: APR
The rally MC, Tasneem Gouda, reminded the crowd that they had been protesting over the massacres for 66 weeks and that “the BDS movement works”.
“We have enabled one of the most popular chains to close down and to lose billions of dollars.
“And to everyone who chooses to continue buying from these brands, let me tell you that every drink, every fry that you buy has blood on it.
“It has the blood of a Palestinian child. It has the blood of a mother.
“Shame on you.”
The BDS rally in support of Palestine at Auckland’s Te Komitanga Square today. Image: APR
The BDS Movement was launched by Palestinians in 2005 with more than 170 organisations backing the initiative. Coordination of the movement followed a couple of years later with a conference in Ramallah, Occupied West Bank.
Aotearoa New Zealand is part of the Asia-Pacific sector of the global movement, grouping Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, South Korea and Thailand.
The Malaysian government is preparing a draft resolution for the United Nations General Assembly to expel Israel over its system of apartheid and the genocide, as South Africa was suspended in 1974 (it was reinstated 20 years later following the end of apartheid).
A poster calling for the expulsion of Israel’s ambassador to New Zealand. Image: APR
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Out of the rubble of last year’s 7.3 magnitude earthquake that hit Vanuatu’s capital Port Vila on December 17 and the snap election due next week on January 16, a new leadership is required to reset the country’s developmental trajectory.
Persistent political turmoil has hampered the Pacific nation’s ability to deal with a compounding set of social and economic shocks over recent years, caused by climate-related and other natural disasters.
The earthquake is estimated to have conservatively caused US$244 million (VUV29 billion) in damage, and the Vanuatu government’s ability to pay for disaster response, the election, and resume public service delivery will require strong, committed and stable leadership.
Prior to the devastating quake and dramatic dissolution of Parliament on November 18, economist Peter Judge from Vanuatu-based Pacific Consulting warned of an evolving economic emergency.
Vanuatu’s US$1 billion economy faced a concerning decline in government revenue from value-added tax, down 25 percent on the previous year.
This was a ripple effect from the decline in economic activity after the collapse of national airline Air Vanuatu last May, as well as the falling revenues from the troubled Citizenship by Investment Programme.
Both were plagued by lack of oversight by parliamentarians.
Struggling economy
In 2024, Vanuatu is expected to record about 1 percent economic growth, as it struggles to climb out of the red and back to pre-pandemic levels.
Conversely, Vanuatu has a much more positive, although somewhat contradictory democratic profile.
According to the Global State of Democracy Initiative, Vanuatu is one of the more democratic states in the Pacific islands region, and currently ranks as 45th in the world.
But this performance comes with a significant price. Leadership turnover is frequent, with 28 prime ministerial terms in just 44 years of statehood, 20 of those in the last 25 years — the highest frequency of change in the Melanesian region.
The impacts of disrupted leadership and political instability are highly visible. Government decision-making and service delivery is grindingly slow.
In Vanuatu’s Parliament, the legislative process is frequently deferred due to regular motions of no confidence, with several critical bills still awaiting MPs’ attention.
Last October, for example, the Vanuatu government proposed a 2025 budget 10 percent smaller than 2024’s, due to reduced economic activity and declining government revenue.
Sudden dissolution
Parliament was unable to approve this year’s budget due to its sudden dissolution on November 18, only two-and-a-half years into a four-year political term.
This is the second consecutive presidential dissolution of Parliament, the previous one in 2022 also occurring barely two-and-a-half years into its term.
The Bill for the appropriation of the 2025 budget now awaits the formation of the next legislature for approval. In the meantime, earthquake recovery and election management costs accumulate under a caretaker government.
With deepening economic hardship and industries facing slow economic growth across multiple sectors, voters are looking for leadership that can stabilise the compounding cost of living pressures.
The new government will need to urgently tackle overdue, unresolved issues pertaining to reliable inter-island transport and air connectivity, outstanding teacher salaries and greater opportunities for the nation’s restive youth.
Democracy with political stability is the holy grail for Vanuatu. But attaining this legendary and supposedly miraculous prize comes with costs attached.
Rules come into force
In response to civic and youth activism in late 2023 calling for political stability and transparency, the last Parliament approved a national referendum to make political affiliation more accountable and end party hopping.The rules come into force in the next parliamentary term for the first time.
The referendum passed successfully on May 29, 2024, but cost US$2.9 million. The 2022 snap election required US$1.4 million and the 2025 poll is expected to require another US$1.6 million.
While revenue from candidature fees of US$250,000 does cover part of these costs, each legislature transition also weighs on the public purse.
The current crop of outgoing 52 parliamentarians were paid out US$1.62 million in gratuities and benefits — around US$31,000 per MP — even though most did not see out their full terms.
Whatever the outcome of the 2025 snap election, the incoming government will need to refocus attention on stabilising the trajectory of Vanuatu’s economy and development.
The next legislature — the 14th — will need to commit to stability in the interests of Vanuatu’s people and the nation’s development.
Budget, earthquake recovery priorities
The most immediate priorities for a new government should be the passage of the 2025 national budget and the implementation of an earthquake recovery and reconstruction plan.
In the 45 years since throwing off the British and French colonial yoke, citizens have enthusiastically done their duty at elections in the expectation of a national leadership that will take Vanuatu forward.
Now their faith appears to be waning, after the 2022 poll saw voter turnout — a key indicator of the health of a democracy — dropped below 50 percent for the first time since independence.
This election therefore needs to see a return on the considerable investment made in Vanuatu’s democratic processes, both in terms of financial cost to successive governments and donors, and more to the point, a political dividend for voters.
Anna Naupa is a ni-Vanuatu scholar and currently a PhD student at the Australian National University. Republished from BenarNews with permission.
An open letter to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in response to the social media giant’s decision to abandon its fact-checking regime protection in the US against hoaxes and conspiracy theories. No New Zealand fact-checkers are on the list of signatories.
Nine years ago, we wrote to you about the real-world harms caused by false information on Facebook. In response, Meta created a fact-checking programme that helped protect millions of users from hoaxes and conspiracy theories. This week, you announced you’re ending that programme in the United States because of concerns about “too much censorship” — a decision that threatens to undo nearly a decade of progress in promoting accurate information online.
The programme that launched in 2016 was a strong step forward in encouraging factual accuracy online. It helped people have a positive experience on Facebook, Instagram and Threads by reducing the spread of false and misleading information in their feeds.
We believe — and data shows — most people on social media are looking for reliable information to make decisions about their lives and to have good interactions with friends and family. Informing users about false information in order to slow its spread, without censoring, was the goal.
Fact-checkers strongly support freedom of expression, and we’ve said that repeatedly and formally in last year’s Sarajevo statement. The freedom to say why something is not true is also free speech.
But you say the programme has become “a tool to censor,” and that “fact-checkers have just been too politically biased and have destroyed more trust than they’ve created, especially in the US.” This is false, and we want to set the record straight, both for today’s context and for the historical record.
Meta required all fact-checking partners to meet strict nonpartisanship standards through verification by the International Fact-Checking Network. This meant no affiliations with political parties or candidates, no policy advocacy, and an unwavering commitment to objectivity and transparency.
Each news organisation undergoes rigorous annual verification, including independent assessment and peer review. Far from questioning these standards, Meta has consistently praised their rigour and effectiveness. Just a year ago, Meta extended the programme to Threads.
Fact-checkers blamed and harassed Your comments suggest fact-checkers were responsible for censorship, even though Meta never gave fact-checkers the ability or the authority to remove content or accounts. People online have often blamed and harassed fact-checkers for Meta’s actions. Your recent comments will no doubt fuel those perceptions.
But the reality is that Meta staff decided on how content found to be false by fact-checkers should be downranked or labeled. Several fact-checkers over the years have suggested to Meta how it could improve this labeling to be less intrusive and avoid even the appearance of censorship, but Meta never acted on those suggestions.
Additionally, Meta exempted politicians and political candidates from fact-checking as a precautionary measure, even when they spread known falsehoods. Fact-checkers, meanwhile, said that politicians should be fact-checked like anyone else.
Over the years, Meta provided only limited information on the programme’s results, even though fact-checkers and independent researchers asked again and again for more data. But from what we could tell, the programme was effective. Research indicated fact-check labels reduced belief in and sharing of false information. And in your own testimony to Congress, you boasted about Meta’s “industry-leading fact-checking programme.”
You said that you plan to start a Community Notes programme similar to that of X. We do not believe that this type of programme will result in a positive user experience, as X has demonstrated.
Researchshows that many Community Notes never get displayed, because they depend on widespread political consensus rather than on standards and evidence for accuracy. Even so, there is no reason Community Notes couldn’t co-exist with the third-party fact-checking programme; they are not mutually exclusive.
A Community Notes model that works in collaboration with professional fact-checking would have strong potential as a new model for promoting accurate information. The need for this is great: If people believe social media platforms are full of scams and hoaxes, they won’t want to spend time there or do business on them.
Political context in US
That brings us to the political context in the United States. Your announcement’s timing came after President-elect Donald Trump’s election certification and as part of a broader response from the tech industry to the incoming administration. Mr Trump himself said your announcement was “probably” in response to threats he’s made against you.
Some of the journalists that are part of our fact-checking community have experienced similar threats from governments in the countries where they work, so we understand how hard it is to resist this pressure.
The plan to end the fact-checking programme in 2025 applies only to the United States, for now. But Meta has similar programmes in more than 100 countries that are all highly diverse, at different stages of democracy and development. Some of these countries are highly vulnerable to misinformation that spurs political instability, election interference, mob violence and even genocide. If Meta decides to stop the programme worldwide, it is almost certain to result in real-world harm in many places.
This moment underlines the need for more funding for public service journalism. Fact-checking is essential to maintaining shared realities and evidence-based discussion, both in the United States and globally. The philanthropic sector has an opportunity to increase its investment in journalism at a critical time.
Most importantly, we believe the decision to end Meta’s third-party fact-checking programme is a step backward for those who want to see an internet that prioritises accurate and trustworthy information. We hope that somehow we can make up this ground in the years to come.
We remain ready to work again with Meta, or any other technology platform that is interested in engaging fact-checking as a tool to give people the information they need to make informed decisions about their daily lives.
Access to truth fuels freedom of speech, empowering communities to align their choices with their values. As journalists, we remain steadfast in our commitment to the freedom of the press, ensuring that the pursuit of truth endures as a cornerstone of democracy.
Editor: Fact-checking organisations continue to sign this letter, and the list is being updated as they do. No New Zealand fact-checking service has been added to the list so far. Republished from the International Fact-Checking Network at the Poynter Institute.
Solomon Islands has the highest-ranked passport of Pacific Island nations, at 37th equal globally.
This is according to the Henley Passport Index.
The index, organised by a consulting firm that describes itself as “the global leader in residence and citizenship by investment,” releases the list based on global travel freedoms using data from the International Air Transport Association.
The index includes 199 different passports and 227 different travel destinations.
The Solomon Islands passport has access to 134 countries out of 227 on the list.
Samoa and Tonga have access to 131 destinations, while the Marshall Islands has access to 129.
Tuvalu is in equal 41st place with access to 128 countries, while Kiribati, the Federated States of Micronesia and Palau can visit 124 countries visa-free.
Further down the list is Vanuatu with access to 92 countries; Fiji with 90; Nauru, 89 and Papua New Guinea, 87.
Singapore tops the global list, with access to 195 countries, ahead of Japan (193 destinations) and six countries in third equal position – Finland, France, Germany, Italy, South Korea and Spain (192 destinations).
The ranking is the highest for New Zealand since 2017. It peaked at No 4 in 2015 but dipped as low as 8th in 2018 and 2019.
At the tail end of the list are countries including Yemen, Iran and Syria, with Afghanistan at the bottom ranked 106th, with only 26 countries allowing visa-free access.
Incidentally, Australia also has the most expensive passport in the world — with a new adult passport costing A$412 (US$255.30) ahead of Mexico (US$222.82), the USA (US$162.36) and New Zealand (US$120.37).
Henley and Partners said it uses a scoring system.
For each travel destination, if no visa is required for passport holders from a country or territory, then a score with value = 1 is created for that passport. A score with value = 1 is also applied if passport holders can obtain a visa on arrival, a visitor’s permit, or an electronic travel authority (ETA) when entering the destination.
The total score for each passport is equal to the number of destinations for which no visa is required (value = 1).
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
To be Jewish does not mean an automatic identification with the rogue state of Israel. Nor does it mean that Jews are automatically threatened by criticism of Israel, yet our media and Labor and Liberal politicians would have you believe this is the case.
We are seeing a debate in Australia about the so-called rise of antisemitism which includes rally chants for Gaza at a time when we are witnessing the most horrific Israeli genocide of Palestinians in which our government is complicit.
Jewish peak bodies here and internationally have continually linked their identity to that of Israel.
Why? Can generations of Jews in this country still believe that Israel represents anything like the myths that were perpetrated at its inception?
The Executive Council of Australian Jewry, the Zionist Federation of Australia, the Jewish Board of Deputies and others, all staunchly defend this apartheid state that is accused of plausible genocide by the UN International Court of Justice and confirmed by dozens of human rights and legal NGOs, UN Rapporteurs, medical organisations and holocaust scholars.
Israel’s Prime Minister and former Defence Minister have been charged as war criminals by the International Criminal Court and must be arrested and tried in the Hague, yet Australia maintains a cosy relationship with Israel and our media dutifully repeats its outright lies verbatim.
Conflating criticism of Israel with antisemitism has been the main focus of the Israeli state and its defenders for decades. With the emergence of the Palestinian-led Boycott Divestment and Sanctions movement in 2005, Israel’s narrative was countered, leading to a persistent Israeli directed campaign to link BDS with antisemitism.
Colonial, occupying power
BDS focuses on the actions of Israel as a colonial, occupying power violating international law against the indigenous people of Palestine. It is anti-racist and human rights-centred.
On December 11, we heard Prime Minister Albanese at the Jewish Museum in Sydney combining his support for Jewish people with his ongoing condemnation and active campaigning against BDS.
He referred to the Marrickville Council BDS motion, (which I proposed back in 2010 along with my Greens councillor colleague, Marika Kontellis), and again repeated the bald-faced mistruths that were spread back then about BDS and the intent and focus of the Marrickville motion.
“I was part of a campaign against BDS in my own local government area. At the time I argued that if you start targeting businesses because they happen to be owned by Jewish people, you’ll end up with the Star of David above shops.
“And that ended in World War II, during the Holocaust, with six million lives lost, murdered. We need an end to antisemitism.”
In one sentence we see Albanese’s extremely offensive equation of the horror of the Holocaust and antisemitism, directly linked to BDS. Why would a prime minister and local federal member deliberately mischaracterise BDS, given the movement has always been clear that its targets are global companies and corporations that are complicit in the Israeli state’s apartheid and genocidal actions, as well as Israeli government bodies and arms companies?
What is in it for Albanese, Wong, Plibersek or Dutton and all of the politicians back in 2010/2011 who appeared to think there was political advantage in scapegoating BDS by jumping on the frenzied anti-BDS campaign?
Fawning support for Israel
It was obvious back then, as it is now, that their fawning support for the rogue Israeli state knows no bounds. Lock step in line with the United States outlier position, Australia has maintained its repugnant inaction in the face of 15 months of Israel’s genocide in Gaza despite continued condemnation by the UN and a majority of states.
But Australia has, however, appointed a public supporter of Zionism and the Israeli state, as its special envoy on antisemitism.
The inaction by all states since 1948 to apply sanctions has gifted Israel the impunity that’s led to its industrial scale slaughter of innocents in Gaza and its continuing violence and killing of civilians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. All governments must bear responsibility for this.
At the time of the Marrickville BDS, he used the situation to attempt to discredit the Greens who were challenging the incumbent Labor state member, Carmel Tebbutt (his former wife). He fanned the national media frenzy that was fed by pro-Israel Jewish lobbyists who were the long-time custodians of the “reputation” of Israel.
Marrickville Council and the Greens were characterised as antisemites who would be pulling Jewish books out of the local library.
This insanity was akin to what is happening today. The legitimate opposition to the worst, most egregious, brutality of the Israeli state has somehow been cleverly morphed into so-called expressions of antisemitism.
Absurd claims on protest
In the media conference of December 11, Albanese also made absurd claims that the peaceful 24-hour protest outside his electorate office in Marrickville was displaying Hamas symbols in a vile attempt to discredit the constituents he had refused to meet for more than eight months.
He and his colleagues in Canberra continue to appease the powerful Israel lobby at the expense of our rights and the rights and visibility of the whole Palestinian population here and in the Occupied Palestinian Territories who are now literally on death row.
Back then, we heard locally that he and the party had bullied the four Labor councillors to vote to rescind the Marrickville BDS motion that they had all previously wholeheartedly supported. Some months earlier these same councillors had also supported a motion condemning the latest Israeli strike against Palestinian civilians in Gaza.
The meaning of BDS was no secret to them — they appreciated that it was important for a council to check its ethical purchasing guidelines to ensure that it was not supporting companies that were in violation of international human rights law by operating in the illegal Israeli settlements or by providing technology or services that maintained Israel’s apartheid and dispossession of Palestinians.
They knew then, as we know now, that this is not antisemitic. They knew then that no Jewish businesses per se were the target of this peaceful civil rights movement. And they knew then that the Labor Party was lying for political gain.
Now, as for far too many decades, political parties in power in this country have failed Palestinians for political gain and at the behest of Israel lobby groups which dare to speak on behalf of anti-Zionist Jews like me.
Despite all the gratuitous rhetoric, these politicians have failed to uphold the basic precepts of human rights law — rights they regularly give lip service to, but rights they will never defend by taking the action required of them as signatories to numerous UN conventions.
Australia must sanction Israel
To act with humanity and to act as required by international law, Australia must sanction and end all economic and military ties with the Israeli state.
We must expel the Israeli ambassador and bring our ambassador back and we must prosecute any Australian citizen or resident who has joined the IDF to kill Palestinians. We must also support Palestinian refugees and take all action necessary to assist those in Gaza for as long as it takes.
But as we have seen so clearly this year, most governments have not acted to pressure Israel to end its barbaric colonial project. To protest as allies and to call out the hypocrisy of governments and politicians that speak of a rules-based order while enabling a state that has continually breached fundamental human rights laws, is to be called antisemitic.
The pressure applied to governments, universities and the like in recent years to adopt the discredited IHRA definition of antisemitism is precisely because it equates criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
It’s the perfect tool for shutting down condemnation of Israel’s grave human rights violations. We’ve seen some universities and parliaments endorse it in deference to this pressure, despite the serious flaws that have been identified, including from Jewish Israeli experts.
Now more than ever BDS is imperative.
BDS campaigns will work to isolate Israel as it should be isolated until it complies with international law. Multinational companies are increasingly loath to be associated with this terror state.
Major pension funds are divesting from companies that are complicit in Israel’s human rights violations and local councils, unions and universities are taking steps to ensure they divest from any partnerships or investments that would make them part of the chain of complicity and liable for prosecution by the International Court of Justice as enabling Israel’s genocide.
The facts are indisputable. Australia’s complicity with Israel’s genocide and colonisation of Palestine can be countered by individuals, churches, unions, councils and students taking immediate and urgent BDS action.
Do not wait for Labor or Liberal politicians in this country to act, as they are doing their best to shut us down and to appease Israel. Their complicity will never be forgotten.
Cathy Peters is a former Greens councillor on the Marrickville Council from 2008-2011 and the co-founder of BDS Australia. She worked as a radio producer and executive producer for the ABC for 30 years making some documentaries on the Israeli occupation. She is Jewish and her grandparents and other relatives perished in the Holocaust. She has travelled to Gaza and throughout the Occupied Palestinian Territories on a number of occasions and is a long-time advocate for Palestinian rights and justice. First published in the Australia social policy journal Pearls and Irritations and republished with permission.
A descendant of one of the original translators of New Zealand’s Treaty of Waitangi says the guarantees of the Treaty have not been honoured.
A group, including 165 descendants of Henry and William Williams, has collectively submitted against the Treaty Principles Bill, saying it was a threat to the original intent and integrity of te Tiriti.
Bill submissions reached a record of more than 300,000 on Tuesday night with Parliament’s Justice Select Committee extending the deadline for a week until 1pm, Tuesday, January 14, due to technical issues with the overloaded website.
The Williams brothers translated te Tiriti o Waitangi and promoted it to Māori chiefs in 1840.
William William’s great-great-great grandson, Martin Williams, told RNZ Morning Report they want to see the promises of the treaty upheld.
“Fundamentally, it’s time that we as Pākeha stood up and be counted . . . we prefer a future for our nation that isn’t premised on the idea that Māori were told a big lie in 1840.”
“It’s very concerning that the Waitangi Tribunal has described this bill as the worst, most comprehensive breach in modern times so it’s time for us to stand up and be counted and stand alongside tangata whenua.
‘We need to honour Te Tiriti’
“We need to honour Te Tiriti, not tear it up and scatter it to the wind.”
The two version of the Treaty — English and Māori — have become the source of debate and confusion over the intervening centuries because of varying content and wording.
Williams said his ancestors had faithfully followed the instructions of Governor Hobson and James Busby when translating the Treaty into te reo Māori.
“We don’t think that there was anything wrong about the way the Treaty was prepared and Henry did it under enormous time pressure, but the outcome was exactly as intended by those instructing him.”
“In essence, the Crown was conferred the right to govern for peace and good order and Māori retained their full rights as chiefs, Tino Rangatiratanga.
“That was the essence of the bargain and we’re wanting that bargain because that was the version that was signed by Māori to be honoured today, and we think it can be. If it is the future for our nation is bright, and if it isn’t the opposite applies.”
Williams said he and his whānau disagreed that the bill would make all New Zealanders, including Māori, equal under the law.
‘Equality’ not a Treaty principle
“Ask Māori who are involved in abuse in state care, whether they enjoyed equal rights during that time of their lives.”
“Equality before the law is a great legal principle, but it’s not a Treaty principle.”
Minister for Regulation David Seymour, the bill’s architect . . . seeking to “promote a national conversation about [New Zealanders’] place in our constitutional arrangements”. Image: RNZ/Samuel Rillstone
“Māori very much, I think, as a result of systemic breach of the Treaty by the Crown again over decades are in a position where they have to start from way behind the line to have any hope of catching up with Pākeha for things that they take for granted.”
Williams said equity and equality were not the same thing.
The bill’s architect, Minister for Regulation David Seymour, argues the interpretation of the Treaty principles has been developed through the Waitangi Tribunal, courts and public service, and “New Zealanders as a whole have never been democratically consulted on these Treaty principles”.
Purpose to ‘provide certainty The principles have been developed to justify actions many New Zealanders feel are “contrary to the principle of equal rights”, he says, including co-governance in the delivery of public services.
The purpose of the bill, says Seymour, is to provide certainty and clarity and to “promote a national conversation about their place in our constitutional arrangements”.
ACT would argue the principles have a very influential role in decision-making, political representation and resource allocation that has gone too far. Seymour believes it is necessary to define the principles “or the courts will continue to venture into an area of political and constitutional importance”.
People have expressed frustration and outrage this week after persisent technical issues stopped them from submitting online feedback about the bill before the midnight on Tuesday night deadline.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Yesterday, during a meeting convened by the French High Commission, Ponga received the support of six of the 11 government members.
These include the four government members from his caucus (Les Loyalistes-Rassemblement), plus the decisive votes from moderate pro-France Calédonie Ensemble’s Jérémie Katidjo-Monnier and Petelo Sao from the Eveil Océanien.
Samuel Hnepeune, the candidate supported by the pro-independence camp, received three votes, from Union Calédonienne (UC)-FLNKS.
Two other agenda items
A more moderate component of the pro-independence group, Union National pour l’Indépendance (UNI) and its two government members, chose to abstain.
However, two other outstanding items on the new government’s agenda remain: the election of a vice-president and the allotment of the government’s portfolios for each minister.
Under the principle of a “collegial” cabinet, the pro-independence camp should get the position of vice-president. But the two main pro-independence groups represented in the government (UNI and UC) said they needed more time to agree on a common candidate.
Under the organic law of New Caledonia, even if the vice-president’s position is not filled, the new government is deemed to be fully operational within seven days following the election of its members.
Who is Alcide Ponga? Alcide Ponga comes from a historically pro-France (“loyalist”) indigenous Kanak lineage and family which includes his father, mother and uncle having held high political positions in New Caledonia’s institutions, all under the then prominent pro-France Rassemblement pour la République (RPCR) headed by historic figure Jacques Lafleur.
His uncle, Maurice Ponga, was also an MP in the European Parliament.
With this family background, Alcide Ponga, who holds a Master in Political Science, joined politics in 2013.
Since 2014, he has been and remains the Mayor of New Caledonia’s small town of Kouaoua, a nickel-mining settlement where he was born.
He became president of the Rassemblement-LR in April 2024.
In June 2024, he was one of the candidates at the French snap general elections, but lost to pro-independence Emmanuel Tjibaou (who won with 57.12 percent of the vote in New Caledonia’s second constituency).
In the private sector, he has also held high positions in the nickel mining industry, including at the Northern Province’s Koniambo Nickel (KNS) company (2010-2024) and before that at the French Société Le Nickel (SLN).
New Caledonia’s 18th government was elected on Tuesday by the French Pacific territory’s Congress.
The new Cabinet
The new 11-seat Cabinet is made up of:
4 members from the Loyalistes/Rassemblement (LR) caucus — Alcide Ponga, Isabelle Champmoreau, Christopher Gygès and Thierry Santa
3 members from the Union Calédonienne-FLNKS caucus — Gilbert Tyuienon, Mickaël Forrest and Samuel Hnepeune
2 members from the Union Nationale pour l’Indépendance (UNI) caucus — Adolphe Digoué and Claude Gambey
2 members from the Calédonie Ensemble/Éveil Océanien caucus — Jérémie Katidjo-Monnier (Calédonie Ensemble) and Petelo Sao (Éveil Océanien)
During his tenure (July 2021 – December 2024), Mapou faced several challenges, including the covid pandemic crisis, the near collapse of New Caledonia’s nickel sector and, more recently, the insurrection riots that erupted on 13 May 2024, and its social and economic consequences.
There has been an estimated 2.2 billion euros (NZ$4 billion) in damage, as well as hundreds of businesses destroyed and/or looted, and the subsequent loss of thousands of jobs.
Speaking to local media just after his election, Ponga said one of his priorities was to restore a spirit of cooperation between New Caledonia’s Congress and his government.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
A former director general of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, Alon Liel, has warned over a “dangerous” attitude of younger generations in Israel towards the war on Gaza.
“They’re accepting the fact that there is no alternative to fighting, and this is the majority, especially the young people today,” he told Al Jazeera in an interview.
He added that as part of the older generation in Israel, he could remember a time when even the right wing used to say they wanted peace.
“Now young people . . . say we don’t want peace. We will not benefit from peace,” he said.
Liel said that he believed it ws “a very dangerous attitude that is developing” and there needed to be “a very fundamental change in the thinking of Israel, and maybe a fundamental change in the attitude of the international community to the conflict, too”.
He also said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had so far failed to achieve his goals in the 15-month war — “destroying” Hamas and freeing the hostages.
Israelis were frustrated that captives remained in Gaza and surprised that, in recent weeks, Israeli military activity there had intensified, Liel said.
‘Surprised’ over military intensity
“Generally speaking, Israelis are quite surprised that the intensity of the military activity is growing. I think the general feeling here was a month or two ago that [the war] will fade away and slow down, but it is not,” he said.
Two Israeli soldiers were killed and six wounded yesterday in further battles with the Palestinian resistance in northern Gaza.
Netanyahu, meanwhile, still faced the problems of looking like he had no victory in the war, and that any prisoner exchange with Hamas could topple him, he added.
“Any exchange will involve the release of many prisoners we have in our jails, and might — and probably will — topple his government,” Liel said.
“So he’s trying to manoeuvre and trying to find the point in time in which we will not be seeing the Hamas people and their supporters dancing in Gaza when they get the prisoners back and describing the result as a victory.”
Brazil court order over Israeli soldier
Francesca Albanese, the UN’s special rapporteur on Palestine, hailed a decision by a court in Brazil to order a probe against a visiting Israeli soldier, saying legal actions against Israelis suspected of crimes in Gaza were “necessary and overdue”.
The remarks on X came in response to the Belgium-based Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF) announcing that a Brazilian court had acted on a complaint it had filed against Israeli solider Yuval Vagdani and ordered the country’s police to launch an investigation.
Israeli media later reported that Vagdani had fled the South American country.
The Hind Rajab Foundation was established to breaking the cycle of Israeli impunity and honouring the memory of Hind Rajab and all those who have perished in the Gaza genocide.
Hind Rajab was a five-year-old girl murdered by Israeli soldiers on 29 January 2024 in a car in which six family members were also killed, and two would-be paramedic rescuers were also slaughtered. She died with 335 bullet wounds in her body.
“Apartheid Israel will go to great lengths to shield its soldiers since a conviction abroad for crimes against Palestinians is a precedent it cannot afford,” Albanese wrote on X.
“Yet, justice is unstoppable,” she said.
In #Brazil and elsewhere, legal actions against Israelis suspected of crimes in Gaza are necessary and overdue. #Apartheid Israel will go to great lengths to shield its soldiers since a conviction abroad for crimes against Palestinians is a precedent it cannot afford. Yet,… https://t.co/y9nNd9GqN3
— Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt (@FranceskAlbs) January 5, 2025
Israeli plans to help accused soldiers The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports Israel’s government was preparing to assist soldiers who may face arrest for participating in war crimes in Gaza when they travel abroad.
So far, more than 50 complaints have been filed against Israeli soldiers in South Africa, Sri Lanka, Belgium, France and Brazil.
Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) ban on Al Jazeera is part of a broader attempt to silence criticism of its security operation in the Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, say activists and analysts.
The ban came almost a month after the PA launched a crackdown on a coalition of armed groups that call themselves the Jenin Brigades, reports Al Jazeera.
Since early December, the PA has besieged the Jenin camp and cut off water and electricity to most of its residents in an ostensible attempt to restore “law and order” across the West Bank.
An Israeli apartheid placard at last Saturday’s Auckland solidarity for Gaza health professionals . . . the crime against humanity includes the “intent to maintain domination of one racial group over another”. Image: APR
indiscriminate Jenin tactics
However, its indiscriminate tactics in Jenin coincide with a wider attack on free speech, activists and human rights groups told Al Jazeera.
Critics have claimed that the PA crackdown due to pressure by the Israeli authorities which have also imposed recent bans on Al Jazeera.
The PA originated with the Oslo Accords between Palestinian and Israeli leaders in 1993. It mandated that the PA recognise Israel and eliminate Palestinian armed groups in exchange for an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel by 1999.
Israel, however, has used the last 30 years block statehood while to expanding illegal settlements on large swathes of stolen Palestinian land, nearly tripling the number of settlers in the occupied West Bank to 700,000.
As an occupying power, it still controls most aspects of Palestinian life and frequently carries out raids, killings and arrests in the West Bank, even in areas where the PA is supposed to be in full control.
Honolulu police have announced the death of a fourth person due to the New Year’s Eve fireworks explosion in Aliamanu, Hawai’i — a 3-year-old boy who has died in hospital.
Six people with severe burn injuries from the explosion were flown to Arizona on the US mainland for further treatment.
“We’re angry, frustrated and deeply saddened at this uneccessary loss of life and suffering,” Honolulu Mayor Rick Blangiardi told a news conference.
Three people died on New Year’s Eve after a Honolulu fireworks explosion. Image: Hawaii Governor/Josh Green FB
“No one should have to endure such pain due to reckless and illegal activity.”
He said this incident was a painful reminder of the danger posed by illegal fireworks.
“They put lives at risk, they drain our first responders, and they disrupt our neighbourhoods.
“Every aerial firework is illegal and this means we need to shut down the root cause — shutting down the pipeline of illegal fireworks entering our islands.”
The Illegal Fireworks Task Force seized 103,000 kilos of fireworks in the last year and a half, yet those cases have resulted in zero criminal charges.
Hawaii News Now obtained the state’s illegal fireworks task force’s 2025 report to lawmakers, revealing the big financial windfall for those who deal in illegal aerials.
The report said “the return on investment for those who smuggle illegal fireworks into Hawai’i is a rate of five to one”.
It also said law enforcement doesn’t have enough money or staff to interdict smuggling at points of entry.
It added that: “the task force is part-time and members have a primary job they must do in addition to task force work.”
The investigation into the explosion continues.
A fifth person died after a separate fireworks blast in Kalihi on New Year’s Eve.
He sustained multiple traumatic injuries, including a severe arm injury, according to Emergency Medical Services.
Meanwhile, five people died across Germany and a police officer was seriously injured from accidents linked to the powerful fireworks Germans traditionally set off to celebrate the new year, police said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) provisional government interim president Benny Wenda has warned that since Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto took office in October, he has been proven right in having remarked, after the politician’s last February election, that his coming marks the return of “the ghost of Suharto” — the brutal dictator who ruled over the nation for three decades.
Wenda, an exiled West Papuan leader, outlined in a December 16 statement that at that moment the Indonesian forces were carrying out ethnic cleansing in multiple regencies, as thousands of West Papuans were being forced out of their villages and into the bush by soldiers.
Prabowo coming to top office has a particular foreboding for the West Papuans, who have been occupied by Indonesia since 1963, as over his military career — which spanned from 1970 to 1998 and saw rise him to the position of general, as well as mainly serve in Kopassus (special forces) — the current president perpetrated multiple alleged atrocities across East Timor and West Papua.
According to Wenda, the incumbent Indonesian president can “never clean the blood from his hands for his crimes as a general in West Papua and East Timor”. He further makes clear that Prabowo’s acts since taking office reveal that he is set on “creating a new regime of brutality” in the country of his birth.
Enhancing the occupation “Foreign governments should not be fooled by Prabowo’s PR campaign,” Wenda made certain in mid-December.
“He is desperately seeking international legitimacy through his international tour, empty environmental pledges and the amnesty offered to various prisoners, including 18 West Papuans and the remaining imprisoned members of the Bali Nine.”
Former Indonesian President Suharto ruled over the Southeast Asian nation with an iron fist from 1967 until 1998.
In the years prior to his officially taking office, General Suharto oversaw the mass murder of up to 1 million local Communists, he further rigged the 1969 referendum on self-determination for West Papua, so that it failed and he invaded East Timor in 1975.
Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto (left) and West Papuan exiled leader Benny Wenda . . . “Foreign governments should not be fooled by Prabowo’s PR campaign.” Image: SCL montage
Wenda maintains that the proof Prabowo is something of an apparition of Suharto is that he has set about forging “mass displacement, increased militarisation” and “increased deforestation” in the Melanesian region of West Papua.
And he has further restarted the transmigration programme of the Suharto days, which involves Indonesians being moved to West Papua to populate the region.
Wenda considers the “occupation was entering a new phase”, when former Indonesian president Joko Widodo split the region of West Papua into five provinces in mid-2022.
Oksop displaced villagers seeking refuge in West Papua. Image: ULMWP
And the West Papuan leader advises that Prabowo is set to establish separate military commands in each province, which will provide “a new, more thorough and far-reaching system of occupation”.
West Papua was previously split into two regions, which the West Papuan people did not recognise, as these and the current five provinces are actually Indonesian administrative zones.
“By establishing new administrative divisions, Indonesia creates the pretext for new military posts and checkpoints,” Wenda underscores.
“The result is the deployment of thousands more soldiers, curfews, arbitrary arrests and human rights abuses. West Papua is under martial law.”
Ecocide on a formidable scale Prabowo paid his first official visit to West Papua as President in November, visiting the Merauke district in South Papua province, which is the site of the world’s largest deforestation project, with clearing beginning in mid-2024, and it will eventually comprise of 2 million deforested hectares turned into giant sugarcane plantations, via the destruction of forests, wetlands and grasslands.
Five consortiums, including Indonesian and foreign companies, are involved in the project, with the first seedlings having been planted in July. And despite promises that the megaproject would not harm existing forests, these areas are being torn down regardless.
And part of this deforestation includes the razing of forest that had previously been declared protected by the government.
A similar programme was established in Merauke district in 2011, by Widodo’s predecessor President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who established rice and sugarcane plantations in the region, aiming to turn it into a “future breadbasket for Indonesia”.
However, the plan was a failure, and the project was rather used as a cover to establish hazardous palm oil and pulpwood plantations.
“It is not a coincidence Prabowo has announced a new transmigration programme at the same time as their ecocidal deforestation regime intensifies,” Wenda said in a November 2024 statement. “These twin agendas represent the two sides of Indonesian colonialism in West Papua: exploitation and settlement.”
Wenda added that Jakarta is only interested in West Papuan land and resources, and in exchange, Indonesia has killed at least half a million West Papuans since 1963.
And while the occupying nation is funding other projects via the profits it has been making on West Papuan palm oil, gold and natural gas, the West Papuan provinces are the poorest in the Southeast Asian nation.
Indonesian military forces on patrol in the Oksop regency of the West Papua region. Image: ULMWP
And part of the agreement was that West Papuans undertake the Act of Free Choice, or a 1969 referendum on self-determination.
So, if the West Papuans did not vote to become an autonomous nation, then Indonesian administration would continue.
However, the UN brokered referendum is now referred to as the Act of “No Choice”, as it only involved 1026 West Papuans, handpicked by Indonesia. And under threat of violence, all of these men voted to stick with their colonial oppressors.
Wenda presented The People’s Petition to the UN Human Rights High Commissioner in January 2019, which calls for a new internationally supervised vote on self-determination for the people of West Papua, and it included the signatures of 1.8 million West Papuans, or 70 percent of the Indigenous population.
The exiled West Papuan leader further announced the formation of the West Papua provisional government on 1 December 2020, which involved the establishment of entire departments of government with heads of staff appointed on the ground in the Melanesian province, and Wenda was also named the president of the body.
But with the coming of Prabowo and the recent developments in West Papua, it appears the West Papuan struggle is about to intensify at the same time as the movement for independence becomes increasingly more prominent on the global stage.
“Every element of West Papua is being systematically destroyed: our land, our people, our Melanesian culture identity,” Wenda said in November, in response to the recommencement of Indonesia’s transmigration programme and the massive environment devastation in Merauke.
“This is why it is not enough to speak about the Act of No Choice in 1969: the violation of our self-determination is continuous, renewed with every new settlement programme, police crackdown, or ecocidal development.”
The fate of Palestinian Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza, who was “arrested” by Israeli forces last month after defiantly staying with his patients when his hospital was being attacked, featured strongly at yesterday’s medical professionals solidarity rally in Auckland.
The Israeli government bears full responsibility for the life of Dr Abu Safiya’s life amid alarming indications of torture and ill-treatment since his detention.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has received information that Dr Abu Safiya’s health has deteriorated due to the torture he endured during his detention, particularly while being held at the Sde Teyman military base in southern Israel.
Euro-Med Monitor warns of the grave risk to his life, following patterns of deliberate killings and deaths under torture previously suffered by other doctors and medical staff arrested from Gaza since October 2023.
Euro-Med Monitor has documented testimonies confirming that Israeli soldiers physically assaulted Dr Abu Safiya immediately after he left the hospital on Friday, 27 December 2024. He was then directly targeted with sound bombs while attempting to evacuate the hospital in compliance with orders from the Israeli army.
According to testimonies gathered by Euro-Med Monitor, the Israeli army subsequently transferred Dr Abu Safiya to a field interrogation site in the Al-Fakhura area of Jabalia Refugee Camp.
There, he was forced to strip off his clothes and was subjected to severe beatings, including being whipped with a thick wire commonly used for street electrical wiring. Soldiers deliberately humiliated him in front of other detainees, including fellow medical staff.
Transferred to Sde Teyman military camp
He was later taken to an undisclosed location before being transferred to the Sde Teyman military camp under Israeli army control.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor has also received information from recently released detainees at the Sde Teyman military camp, confirming that Dr Abu Safiya was subjected to severe torture, leading to a significant deterioration in his health.
Protester Jason holds a placard calling for Kamal Adwan Hospital medical director Dr Hussam Abu Safiya to be set free at yesterday’s Palestinian solidarity rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/APR
This occurred despite him already being wounded by Israeli air strikes on the hospital, where he worked tirelessly until the facility was stormed and set ablaze by Israeli forces.
The Israeli army has attempted to mislead the public regarding Dr Abu Safiya’s detention and torture.
Pro-Israeli media outlets circulated a misleading promotional video portraying his treatment as humane, even though he was tortured and humiliated immediately after filming.
Euro-Med Monitor warns of the severe implications of Israel’s denial of Dr Abu Safiya’s detention, describing this as a deeply troubling indicator of his fate and detention conditions. This denial also reflects a blatant disregard for binding legal standards.
Physicians for Human Rights — Israel (PHRI) submitted a request on behalf of Dr Abu Safiya’s family to obtain information and facilitate a lawyer’s visit on 2 January 2024. However, the Israeli authorities claimed to have no record of his detention, stating they had no indication of his arrest.
Dr Hussam Abu Safiya . . . subjected to severe torture, leading to a significant deterioration in his health. Image: Euro-Med Monitor
Deep concern over execution risk
Euro-Med Monitor expresses deep concern that Dr Abu Safiya may face execution during his detention, similar to the fate of Dr Adnan Al-Bursh, head of the orthopaedics department at Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, who was killed under torture at Ofer Detention Centre on 19 April 2024.
Dr Al-Bursh had been detained along with colleagues from Al-Awda Hospital in December 2023.
Likewise, Dr Iyad Al-Rantisi, head of the obstetrics department at Kamal Adwan Hospital, was killed due to torture at an Israeli Shin Bet interrogation centre in Ashkelon, one week after his detention in November 2023. Israeli authorities concealed his death for more than seven months.
Dozens of doctors and medical staff remain subjected to arbitrary detention and enforced disappearance in Israeli prisons and detention centres, where they face severe torture and solitary confinement, according to testimonies from former detainees.
The last photograph of the director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Gaza, Dr Hussam Abu Safiya, before he was arrested and abducted by Israeli forces. Image: @jeremycorbyn screenshot APR
The detention of Dr Abu Safiya must be understood within the context of Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza, which has persisted for nearly 15 months. His arrest, torture, and potential execution form part of a broader strategy aimed at destroying the Palestinian people in Gaza — both physically and psychologically — and breaking their will.
This strategy includes not only the deliberate destruction of the health sector and the disruption of medical staff operations, particularly in northern Gaza, but also an attack on the symbolic and humanitarian role represented by Dr Abu Safiya.
Despite the grave crimes committed against Kamal Adwan Hospital, its staff, and patients, especially in the past two months, Dr Abu Safiya remained unwavering in his dedication to providing essential medical care and fulfilling his medical duties.
Call on states, UN to take immediate steps
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor calls on all concerned states, international entities, and UN bodies to take immediate and effective measures to secure the unconditional release of Dr Abu Safiya. His fundamental rights to life, physical safety, and dignity must be protected, shielding him from torture or any cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.
Euro-Med Monitor also urges international and local human rights organisations to be granted full access to visit Dr Abu Safiya, monitor his health condition, provide necessary medical treatment, and ensure he is free from human rights violations until his release.
Furthermore, Euro-Med Monitor reiterates its call for the United Nations to deploy an international investigative mission to examine the grave crimes and violations faced by Palestinian detainees in Israeli prisons.
It calls for the immediate release of those detained arbitrarily, for international and local organisations to be granted visitation rights, and for detainees to have access to legal representation.
Euro-Med Monitor expresses regret over the continued inaction of Alice Jill Edwards, the Special Rapporteur on Torture, who has failed to address these atrocities. It condemns her bias and deliberate negligence in fulfilling her mandate and calls for her dismissal.
A new Special Rapporteur who is neutral and committed to universal human rights principles must be appointed.
Additionally, Euro-Med Monitor urges the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary, or Arbitrary Executions, the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, and the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances to conduct immediate and thorough investigations into crimes committed by the Israeli military in Gaza.
Call for prosecution of Israeli crimes
It calls for direct engagement with victims and families, as well as for reports to be submitted to pave the way for investigative committees, fact-finding missions, and international courts to prosecute Israeli crimes, hold perpetrators accountable, and compensate victims in line with international law.
Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor renews its call for relevant states and entities to fulfil their legal obligations to halt the genocide in Gaza.
This includes imposing a comprehensive arms embargo on Israel, holding it accountable for its crimes, and taking effective measures to protect Palestinian civilians. Immediate steps must also be taken to prevent forced displacement, ensure the return of residents, release arbitrarily detained Palestinians, and facilitate the urgent entry of life-saving humanitarian aid into Gaza without obstacles.
Finally, Euro-Med Monitor demands the withdrawal of Israeli occupation forces from the entire Gaza Strip.
Israel is forcing two hospitals in northern Gaza to evacuate under threat of attack as its ethnic cleansing campaign continues.
Israeli forces have surrounded the Indonesian Hospital, where many staff and patients sought shelter after nearby Kamal Adwan Hospital was destroyed in an Israeli raid last week, reports Al Jazeera.
Late on Friday, a forced order to evacuate was also issued for the al-Awda Hospital, where 100 people are believed to be sheltering.
The evacuation order came today as New Zealand Palestine solidarity protesters followed a silent vigil outside Auckland Hospital yesterday with a rally in downtown Auckland’s Te Komititanga Square today, where doctors and other professional health staff called for support for Gaza’s besieged health facilities and protection for medical workers.
Protester Jason holds a placard calling for Kamal Adwan Hospital medical director Dr Hussam Abu Safiyyan to be set free at today’s Palestinian solidarity rally in Auckland. Image: David Robie/APR
When one New Zealand medical professional recalled the first time that the Israel military bombed a hospital in in Gaza November 2023, the world was “ready to accept the the lies that Israel told then”.
“Of course, they wouldn’t bomb a hospital, who would bomb a hospital? That’s a horrible war crime, if must have been Hamas that bombed themselves.
“And the world let Israel get away with it. That’s the time that we knew if the world let Israel get away with it once, they would repeat it again and again and we would allow a dangerous precedent to be set where health care workers and health care centres would become targets over and over again.
“In the past year it is exactly what we have seen,” he said to cries of shame.
“We have seen not only the targeting of health care infrastructure, but the targeting of healthcare workers.
“The murdering of healthcare workers, of aid workers all across Gaza at the hands of Israel — openly without any word of opposition from our government, without a word of opposition from any global government about these war crimes and genocidal actions until today.”
In an impassioned speech about the devastating price that Gazans were paying for the Israeli war, New Zealand Palestinian doctor and Gaza survivor Dr Abdallah Gouda vowed that his people would keep their dream for an independent state of Palestine and “we will never leave Gaza”.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has called for an investigation into the Israeli attacks on Gaza hospitals and medical workers.
Volker Türktold the UN Security Council meeting on the Middle East that Israeli claims of Hamas launching attacks from hospitals in Gaza were often “vague” and sometimes “contradicted by publicly available information”.
Tino rangatiratanga and Palestinian flags at the Gazan health workers solidarity rally in Auckland today. Image: David Robie/APR
Palestine urges UN to end Gaza genocide, ‘Israeli impunity’ Riyad Mansour, the Palestinian envoy to the UN, said: “It is our collective responsibility to bring this hell to an end. It is our collective responsibility to bring this genocide to an end.”
The UNSC meeting on the Middle East came following last week’s raid on the Kamal Adwan Hospital and the arbitrary arrest and detention of its director, Hussam Abu Safia.
“You have an obligation to save lives”, Mansour told the council.
“Palestinian doctors and medical personnel took that mission to heart at the peril of their lives. They did not abandon the victims.
“Do not abandon them. End Israeli impunity. End the genocide. End this aggression immediately and unconditionally, now.”
Palestinian doctors and medical personnel were fighting to save human lives and losing their own while hospitals are under attack, he added.
“They are fighting a battle they cannot win, and yet they are unwilling to surrender and to betray the oath they took,” he said.
Norway is the latest country to condemn the attacks on Gaza’s hospitals and medical workers.
On X, the country’s Foreign Ministry said that “urgent action” was needed to restore north Gaza’s hospitals, which were continuously subjected to Israeli attack.
Without naming Israel, the ministry said that “health workers, patients and hospitals are not lawful targets”.
Urgent action is needed to restore North Gaza’s hospitals and uphold international humanitarian law.
Protecting healthcare saves lives.
We share WHOs concern at #UNSC
A critical “NZ media is Zionist media” placard at today’s Auckland solidarity rally for Palestinian health workers. Image: APR
Israel ‘deprives 40,000’ of healthcare in northern Gaza The Israeli military is systematically destroying hospitals in northern Gaza, the Gaza Government Media Office said.
In a statement, it said: “The Israeli occupation continues its heinous crimes and arbitrary aggression against hospitals and medical teams in northern Gaza, reflecting a dangerous and deliberate escalation.”
These acts, it added, were being carried out amid “unjustified silence of the international community and the UN Security Council”, violating international humanitarian law and human rights conventions.
The statement highlighted the destruction of Kamal Adwan Hospital, where its director, Dr Hussam Abu Safia, was arrested and reportedly subjected to physical and psychological abuse.
The GMO described these acts as “full-fledged war crimes”.
According to a recent report by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Israeli military had conducted more than 136 air raids on at least 27 hospitals and 12 medical facilities across Gaza in the past eight months.
The GMO report demanded an independent international investigation into these violations and accountability for Israel in international courts.
Protesters at today’s Auckland rally in solidarity with Palestinian health workers under attack from Israeli military. Image: David Robie/APR
Amnesty International criticises detention of Kamal Adwan doctor Agnes Callamard, secretary-general of the human rights watchdog Amnesty International, said Israel’s detention of Dr Hussam Abu Safia underscored a pattern of “genocidal intent and genocidal acts” by Israel in Gaza.
“Dr Abu Safia’s unlawful detention is emblematic of the broader attacks on the healthcare sector in Gaza and Israel’s attempts to annihilate it,” Callamard said in a social media post.
“None of the medical staff abducted by Israeli forces since November 2023 from Gaza during raids on hospitals and clinics has been charged or put before a trial; those released after enduring unimaginable torture were never charged and did not stand trial.
“Those still detained remain held without charges or trial under inhumane conditions and at risk of torture,” she added.
Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa secretary Neil Scott speaking at today’s Auckland rally supporting health workers under Israeli attack in Gaza. Image: David Robie/APR
A man has been charged with the rape and sexual assault of one of the Virgin Australia crew members in the early hours of New Year’s Day, near a nightclub in Martintar, Nadi.
Police confirm he has been charged with one count of sexual assault and one count of rape.
They say he is in custody and will appear in the Nadi Magistrates Court on Monday.
Police have yet to charge anyone in relation to the robbery of another crew member.
Meanwhile, the crew members have now returned to Australia.
A female crew member, who was allegedly sexually assaulted near the club, flew back to Australia yesterday while her male colleague returned on Thursday after receiving treatment for facial wounds.
Five other crew members remained in Fiji to assist the investigation, staying close to their hotel as directed by their airline’s headquarters.
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Tourism Viliame Gavoka said in an earlier statement that regrettably incidents like this could happen anywhere and Fiji was not immune.
He reminded tourists to exercise caution in nightclub areas and late at night.
Republished from Fijivillage News with permission.
Navigating the shared challenges of climate change, geostrategic tensions, political upheaval, disaster recovery and decolonisation plus a 50th birthday party, reports a BenarNews contributor’s analysis.
COMMENTARY:By Tess Newton Cain
Vanuatu’s devastating earthquake and dramatic political developments in Tonga and New Caledonia at the end of 2024 set the tone for the coming year in the Pacific.
The incoming Trump administration adds another level of uncertainty, ranging from the geostrategic competition with China and the region’s resulting militarisation through to the U.S. response to climate change.
And decolonisation for a number of territories in the Pacific will remain in focus as the region’s largest country celebrates its 50th anniversary of independence.
The deadly 7.3 earthquake that struck Port Vila on December 17 has left Vanuatu reeling. As the country moves from response to recovery, the full impacts of the damage will come to light.
The economic hit will be significant, with some businesses announcing that they will not open until well into the New Year or later.
Amid the physical carnage there’s Vanuatu’s political turmoil, with a snap general election triggered in November before the disaster struck to go ahead on January 16.
On Christmas Eve a new prime minister was elected in Tonga. ‘Aisake Valu Eke is a veteran politician, who has previously served as Minister of Finance. He succeeded Siaosi Sovaleni who resigned suddenly after a prolonged period of tension between his office and the Tongan royal family.
Eke takes the reins as Tonga heads towards national elections, due before the end of November. He will likely want to keep things stable and low key between now and then.
Fall of New Caledonia government
In Kanaky New Caledonia, the resignation of the Calédonie Ensemble party — also on Christmas Eve — led to the fall of the French territory’s government.
After last year’s violence and civil disorder – that crippled the economy but stopped a controversial electoral reform — the political turmoil jeopardises about US$77 million (75 million euro) of a US$237 million recovery funding package from France.
In addition, and given the fall of the Barnier government in Paris, attempts to reach a workable political settlement in New Caledonia are likely to be severely hampered, including any further movement to secure independence.
Possibly the biggest party in the Pacific in 2025 will be the 50th anniversary of Papua New Guinea’s independence from Australia, accompanied hopefully by some reflection and action about the country’s future.
Eagerly awaited also will be the data from the country’s flawed census last year, due for release on the same day — September 16. But the celebrations will also serve as a reminder of unfinished self-determination business, with its Autonomous Region of Bougainville preparing for their independence declaration in the next two years.
The shadow of geopolitics looms large in the Pacific islands region. There is no reason to think that will change this year.
Trump administration unkowns
A significant unknown is how the incoming Trump administration will alter policy and funding settings, if at all. The current (re)engagement by the US in the region started with Trump during his first incumbency. His 2019 meeting with the then leaders of the compact states — Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Republic of Marshall Islands — at the White House was a pivotal moment.
Under Biden, billions of dollars have been committed to “securitise” the region in response to China. This year, we expect to see US marines start to transfer in numbers from Okinawa to Guam.
However, given Trump’s history and rhetoric when it comes to climate change, there is some concern about how reliable an ally the US will be when it comes to this vital security challenge for the region.
The last time Trump entered the White House, he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement and he is widely expected to do the same again this time around.
In addition to polls in Tonga and Vanuatu, elections will be held in the Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, New Caledonia and for the Autonomous Bougainville Government.
There will also be a federal election in Australia, the biggest aid donor in the Pacific, and a change in government will almost certainly have impacts in the region.
Given the sway that the national security community has on both sides of Australian politics, the centrality of Pacific engagement to foreign policy, particularly in response to China, is unlikely to change.
Likely climate policy change
How that manifests could look quite different under a conservative Liberal/National party government. The most likely change is in climate policy, including an avowed commitment to invest in nuclear power.
A refusal to shift away from fossil fuels or commit to enhanced finance for adaptation by a new administration could reignite tensions within the Pacific Islands Forum that have, to some extent, been quietened under Labor’s Albanese government.
Who is in government could also impact on the bid to host COP31 in 2026, with a decision between candidates Turkey and Australia not due until June, after the poll.
Pacific leaders and advocates face a systemic challenge regarding climate change. With the rise in conflict and geopolitical competition, the global focus on the climate crisis has weakened. The prevailing sense of disappointment over COP29 last year is likely to continue as partners’ engagement becomes increasingly securitised.
A major global event for this year is the Oceans Summit which will be held in Nice, France, in June. This is a critical forum for Pacific countries to take their climate diplomacy to a new level and attack the problem at its core.
In 2023, the G20 countries were responsible for 76 percent of global emissions. By capitalising on the geopolitical moment, the Pacific could nudge the key players to greater ambition.
Several G20 countries are seeking to expand and deepen their influence in the region alongside the five largest emitters — China, US, India, Russia, and Japan — all of which have strategic interests in the Pacific.
Given the increasingly transactional nature of Pacific engagement, 2025 should present an opportunity for Pacific governments to leverage their geostrategic capital in ways that will address human security for their peoples.
Dr Tess Newton Cain is a principal consultant at Sustineo P/L and adjunct associate professor at the Griffith Asia Institute. She is a former lecturer at the University of the South Pacific and has over 25 years of experience working in the Pacific islands region. The views expressed here are hers, not those of BenarNews/RFA. Republished from BenarNews with permission.
With the door now shut on 2024, many will heave a sigh of relief and hope for better things this year.
Decolonisation issues involving the future of Kanaky New Caledonia and West Papua – and also in the Middle East with controversial United Nations votes by some Pacific nations in the middle of a livestreamed genocide — figured high on the agenda in the past year along with the global climate crisis and inadequate funding rescue packages.
Asia Pacific Report looks at some of the issues and developments during the year that were regarded by critics as betrayals:
The assembly passed a resolution on December 11 demanding an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, which was adopted with 158 votes in favour from the 193-member assembly and nine votes against with 13 abstentions.
Of the nine countries voting against, the three Pacific nations that sided with Israel and its relentless backer United States were Nauru, Papua New Guinea and Tonga.
The other countries that voted against were Argentina, Czech Republic, Hungary and Paraguay.
Thirteen abstentions included Fiji, which had previously controversially voted with Israel, Micronesia, and Palau. Supporters of the resolution in the Pacific region included Australia, New Zealand, and Timor-Leste.
Ironically, it was announced a day before the UNGA vote that the United States will spend more than US$864 million (3.5 billion kina) on infrastructure and military training in Papua New Guinea over 10 years under a defence deal signed between the two nations in 2023, according to PNG’s Foreign Minister Justin Tkatchenko.
Any connection? Your guess is as good as mine. Certainly it is very revealing how realpolitik is playing out in the region with an “Indo-Pacific buffer” against China.
However, the deal actually originated almost two years earlier, in May 2023, with the size of the package reflecting a growing US security engagement with Pacific island nations as it seeks to counter China’s inroads in the vast ocean region.
Noted BenarNews, a US soft power news service in the region, the planned investment is part of a defence cooperation agreement granting the US military “unimpeded access” to develop and deploy forces from six ports and airports, including Lombrum Naval Base.
Two months before PNG’s vote, the UNGA overwhelmingly passed a resolution demanding that the Israeli government end its occupation of Palestinian territories within 12 months — but half of the 14 countries that voted against were from the Pacific.
Affirming an International Court of Justice (ICJ) opinion requested by the UN that deemed the decades-long occupation unlawful, the opposition from seven Pacific nations further marginalised the island region from world opinion against Israel.
Several UN experts and officials warned against Israel becoming a global “pariah” state over its 15 month genocidal war on Gaza.
The final vote tally was 124 member states in favour and 14 against, with 43 nations abstaining. The Pacific countries that voted with Israel and its main ally and arms-supplier United States against the Palestinian resolution were Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Palau, Tonga and Tuvalu.
Flags of decolonisation in Suva, Fiji . . . the Morning Star flag of West Papua (colonised by Indonesia) and the flag of Palestine (militarily occupied illegally and under attack from Israel). Image: APR
In February, Fiji faced widespread condemnation after it joined the US as one of the only two countries — branded as the “outliers” — to support Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territory in an UNGA vote over an International Court of Justice (ICJ) advisory opinion over Israel’s policies in the occupied territories.
Fiji’s envoy at the UN, retired Colonel Filipo Tarakinikini, defended the country’s stance, saying the court “fails to take account of the complexity of this dispute, and misrepresents the legal, historical, and political context”.
However, Fiji NGOs condemned the Fiji vote as supporting “settler colonialism” and long-standing Fijian diplomats such as Kaliopate Tavola and Robin Nair said Fiji had crossed the line by breaking with its established foreign policy of “friends-to-all-and-enemies-to-none”.
Indonesian military forces on patrol in the Oksop regency of the West Papua region.
2. West Papuan self-determination left in limbo For the past decade, Pacific Island Forum countries have been trying to get a fact-finding human mission deployed to West Papua. But they have encountered zero progress with continuous roadblocks being placed by Jakarta.
Pacific leaders have asked for the UN’s involvement over reported abuses as the Indonesian military continues its battles with West Papuan independence fighters.
A highly critical UN Human Right Committee report on Indonesia released in May highlighted “systematic reports about the use of torture” and “extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances of Indigenous Papuan people”.
But the situation is worse now since President Prabowo Subianto, the former general who has a cloud of human rights violations hanging over his head, took office in October.
Fiji’s Sitiveni Rabuka and Papua New Guinea’s James Marape were appointed by the Melanesian Spearhead Group in 2023 as special envoys to push for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights’ visit directly with Indonesia’s president.
Prabowo taking up the top job in Jakarta has filled West Papuan advocates and activists with dread as this is seen as marking a return of “the ghost of Suharto” because of his history of alleged atrocities in West Papua, and also in Timor-Leste before independence.
Already Prabowo’s acts since becoming president with restoring the controversial transmigration policies, reinforcing and intensifying the military occupation, fuelling an aggressive “anti-environment” development strategy, have heralded a new “regime of brutality”.
And Marape and Rabuka, who pledged to exiled indigenous leader Benny Wenda in Suva in February 2023 that he would support the Papuans “because they are Melanesians”, have been accused of failing the West Papuan cause.
Protesters at Molodoï, Strasbourg, demanding the release of Kanak indigenous political prisoners being detained in France pending trial for their alleged role in the pro-independence riots in May 2024. Image: @67Kanaky /X
3. France rolls back almost four decades of decolonisation progress
When pro-independence protests erupted into violent rioting in Kanaky New Caledonia on May 13, creating havoc and destruction in the capital of Nouméa and across the French Pacific territory with 14 people dead, intransigent French policies were blamed for having betrayed Kanak aspirations for independence.
While acknowledging the goodwill and progress that had been made since the 1988 Matignon accords and the Nouméa pact a decade later following the bloody 1980s insurrection, the French government lost the self-determination trajectory after two narrowly defeated independence referendums and a third vote boycotted by Kanaks because of the covid pandemic.
This third vote with less than half the electorate taking part had no credibility, but Paris insisted on bulldozing constitutional electoral changes that would have severely disenfranchised the indigenous vote. More than 36 years of constructive progress had been wiped out.
“It’s really three decades of hard work by a lot of people to build, sort of like a future for Kanaky New Caledonia, which is part of the Pacific rather than part of France,” I was quoted as saying.
France had had three prime ministers since 2020 and none of them seemed to have any “real affinity” for indigenous issues, particularly in the South Pacific, in contrast to some previous leaders.
In the wake of a snap general election in mainland France, when President Emmanuel Macron lost his centrist mandate and is now squeezed between the polarised far right National Rally and the left coalition New Popular Front, the controversial electoral reform was quietly scrapped.
New French Overseas Minister Manual Valls has heralded a new era of negotiation over self-determination. In November, he criticised Macron’s “stubbornness’ in an interview with the French national daily Le Parisien, blaming him for “ruining 36 years of dialogue, of progress”.
But New Caledonia is not the only headache for France while pushing for its own version of an “Indo-Pacific” strategy. Pro-independence French Polynesian President Moetai Brotherson and civil society leaders have called on the UN to bring Paris to negotiations over a timetable for decolonisation.
West Papuan leader Benny Wenda (left) and Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka . . . “We will support them [ULMWP] because they are Melanesians.” Rabuka also had a Pacific role with New Caledonia. Image: Fiji govt/RNZ Pacific4. Pacific Islands Forum also fails Kanak aspirations
Kanaks and the Pacific’s pro-decolonisation activists had hoped that an intervention by the Pacific Islands Forum in support of the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) would enhance their self-determination stocks.
However, they were disappointed. And their own internal political divisions have not made things any easier.
On the eve of the three-day fact-finding delegation to the territory in October, Fiji’s Rabuka was already warning the local government (led by pro-independence Louis Mapou to “be reasonable” in its demands from Paris.
Rabuka and Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown and then Tongan counterpart Hu’akavameiliku Siaosi Sovaleni visited the French territory not to “interfere” but to “lower the temperature”.
But an Australian proposal for a peacekeeping force under the Australian-backed Pacific Policing Initiative (PPI) fell flat, and the mission was generally considered a failure for Kanak indigenous aspirations.
Taking the planet’s biggest problem to the world’s highest court for global climate justice. Image: X/@ciel_tweets
5. Climate crisis — the real issue and geopolitics
In spite of the geopolitical pressures from countries, such as the US, Australia and France, in the region in the face of growing Chinese influence, the real issue for the Pacific remains climate crisis and what to do about it.
Controversy marked an A$140 million aid pact signed between Australia and Nauru last month in what was being touted as a key example of the geopolitical tightrope being forced on vulnerable Pacific countries.
This agreement offers Nauru direct budgetary support, banking services and assistance with policing and security. The strings attached? Australia has been granted the right to veto any agreement with a third country such as China.
Critics have compared this power of veto to another agreement signed between Australia and Tuvalu in 2023 which provided Australian residency opportunities and support for climate mitigation. However, in return Australia was handed guarantees over security.
The previous month, November, was another disappointment for the Pacific when it was “once again ignored” at the UN COP29 climate summit in the capital Baku of oil and natural gas-rich Azerbaijan.
The Suva-based Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN) condemned the outcomes as another betrayal, saying that the “richest nations turned their backs on their legal and moral obligations” at what had been billed as the “finance COP”.
The new climate finance pledge of a US$300 billion annual target by 2035 for the global fight against climate change was well short of the requested US$1 trillion in aid.
Climate campaigners and activist groups branded it as a “shameful failure of leadership” that forced Pacific nations to accept the “token pledge” to prevent the negotiations from collapsing.
Much depends on a climate justice breakthrough with Vanuatu’s landmark case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) arguing that those harming the climate are breaking international law.
The case seeks an advisory opinion from the court on the legal responsibilities of countries over the climate crisis, and many nations in support of Vanuatu made oral submissions last month and are now awaiting adjudication.
Given the primacy of climate crisis and vital need for funding for adaptation, mitigation and loss and damage faced by vulnerable Pacific countries, former Pacific Islands Forum Secretary-General Meg Taylor delivered a warning:
“Pacific leaders are being side-lined in major geopolitical decisions affecting their region and they need to start raising their voices for the sake of their citizens.”
Journalists gathered at Gaza’s Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital expressed outrage and confusion about the Palestinian Authority’s (PA) decision to shut down Al Jazeera’s office in the occupied West Bank.
“Shutting down a major outlet like Al Jazeera is a crime against journalism,” said freelance journalist Ikhlas al-Qarnawi.
“Al Jazeera coverage has documented Israeli crimes against Palestinians, especially during the ongoing genocide,” the 28-year-old journalist told Al Jazeera at the hospital, the most reliable internet connection in the Strip to file stories from.
Yesterday, the PA temporarily suspended Al Jazeera in the occupied West Bank for what they described as broadcasting “inciting material and reports that were deceiving and stirring strife” in the country.
The decision came after Fatah, the Palestinian faction which dominates the PA, banned Al Jazeera from reporting from the governorates of Jenin, Tubas and Qalqilya in the occupied West Bank, citing its coverage of clashes between the Palestinian security forces and Palestinian armed groups in the area.
Al Jazeera criticised the PA ban, saying the move is “in line with the [Israeli] occupation’s actions against its staff”.
‘Obscuring the truth’ Since the beginning of the war, about 150 journalists have been working from the journalists’ tents at Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital, for 20 local, international and Arab media outlets.
Journalists, including those from Al Jazeera, have been forced to work from hospitals after their headquarters and media offices were destroyed.
PA decision ‘shocking but hardly surprising’. Video: Al Jazeera
Al-Aqsa TV correspondent Mohammed Issa said from the hospital that the PA’s ban contradicts international laws that guarantee journalistic freedom and could further endanger journalists.
“The PA’s decision obscures the truth and undermines the Palestinian narrative, especially a leading network like Al Jazeera,” Issa said, adding that the ban reinforces Israel’s narrative that “justifies the targeting of Palestinian journalists”.
Independent journalist Wafa Hajjaj . . . the PA’s move against Al Jazeera “worsens the situation” Image: Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera
“All media workers in Gaza reject this decision that silences the largest Arab and global outlet during critical times in years.”
Wafaa Hajjaj, an independent journalist working with TRT and Sahat, said the ban made her both “sad” and “disappointed”.
“At a time when Israel is deliberately targeting and killing … journalists in Gaza, with our Jazeera colleagues at the forefront, with no international or institutional protection, the PA’s move in the West Bank comes to worsen the situation,” Hajjaj said as she and her team walked into the hospital to interview the wounded.
Israel has killed at least 217 journalists and media workers in Gaza since the beginning of its war on Gaza on October 7, 2023.
Four of them were Al Jazeera journalists: Samer Abudaqa, Hamza al-Dahdouh, Ismail al-Ghoul and Ahmed al-Louh.
‘Trust Al Jazeera will persist’ Although frustrated, Hajjaj told Al Jazeera that she was hopeful the PA would drop its ban “as soon as possible”.
“I trust Al Jazeera will persist despite all sanctions, as it has for years.”
Yousef Hassouna, a photojournalist with 22 years of experience, also criticised the shutting of Al Jazeera along with “any other media outlet” targeted by such bans.
“This is a violation against all of us Palestinian journalists,” he said, adding that Al Jazeera was “an essential platform” covering Israel’s war on Gaza.
“Now more than ever, we Palestinian journalists need international support and protection, not limitations or restrictions,” Hassouna said.
Freelance journalist Ikhlas al-Qarnawi . . . the closure of Al Jazeera in thde West Bank is a “crime against journalism”. Image: Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera
‘Critical mistakes’
Ismail al-Thawabtah, spokesperson for the government media bureau in Gaza, said the Palestinian Authority had committed two serious mistakes over the past few weeks.
“The first: the attack on Jenin and the resulting military confrontation with our honourable Palestinian people and the resistance forces, and the second: the closure of the Al Jazeera office,” he said, adding that the move represents “serious violations of freedom of the press”.
Al-Thawabtah said both incidents required the PA to conduct a comprehensive review of policies and positions in line with supreme national interests and respect for the “rights of our Palestinian people and their basic freedoms”.
As for the journalists gathered at Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Hospital, they were united in their call to end the ban.
“We as journalists are completely against it. I hope that action will be taken to stop this decision immediately.” said the freelance journalist al-Qarnawi, adding that the ban hurts more than just journalists.
“Our Palestinian people are the biggest losers.”
Republished from Al Jazeera under Creative Commons.
The Cook Islands will not pursue membership in the United Nations and the Commonwealth due to its inability to meet the criteria for UN membership and existing relationship with New Zealand, which fulfils Commonwealth membership requirements.
Prime Minister Mark Brown has clarified that the Cook Islands is not qualified for UN membership, a long-standing government proposal that has remained uncertain.
In an exclusive interview with Cook Islands News, Brown was asked to provide an update on the government’s plans for a UN membership.
“That’s old news now, I mean we’ve been around the block with that a few years, and a few times,” Brown said.
“So that’s again another one, we haven’t pursued that. There are a number of criteria that the UN requires for membership and according to them, we don’t meet those requirements.”
Cook Islands has maintained diplomatic ties with the UN since the 1990s. It is not currently a member of the UN.
Earlier this year, the Cook Islands government applied for membership with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), a first step on the road to becoming a member of the UN.
Cook Islands Minister for Foreign Affairs Tingika Elikana then told RNZ that the decision to become a UN member would ultimately need to be decided by the general population of the Cook Islands through a referendum.
The Cook Islands is part of the realm of New Zealand, which makes Cook Islanders also New Zealand citizens. If the Cook Islands joins the United Nations as a separate member to NZ, it would potentially forfeit its citizenship rights under the current treaty which binds the nations.
Cook Islands Foreign Affairs Minister Tingika Elikana . . . “I think a referendum would need to be run and then we will enter into discussions with New Zealand.” Image: Johnny Blades/VNP
“I don’t think short-term elected politicians should decide on that. I think a referendum would need to be run and then we will enter into discussions with New Zealand,” Elikana then said.
When asked about the possibility of joining the Commonwealth, an international association of 56 member states, primarily comprised of former British territories, Brown said the government would not be making another effort to try and become a member.
“We did enquire a number of years ago about it, but the understanding was because we’re part of the realm of New Zealand, that is considered our membership in the Commonwealth, even though we don’t have any place at the table, and we don’t speak at the Commonwealth,” Brown explained.
“So, they consider that our realm relationship is where we are in terms of Commonwealth membership.”
Cook Islands News understands the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Immigration has written to the Commonwealth Secretariat about the country’s membership.
Brown confirmed that a letter had already been submitted to the Commonwealth for that purpose, but he was uncertain whether a response had been received.
“But from what I understand, that is the response that we’ve had from officials at the Commonwealth, is that they consider us through New Zealand as part of the realm of New Zealand as already being covered in the Commonwealth, even though we don’t have a seat or a voice there.”
When asked if this would be considered the government’s final attempt to gain Commonwealth membership, the Prime Minister responded “yes”.
“I think so, I mean I’ve got to weigh it up as well with what benefit we get from being part of the CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting),” he said.
Brown added that there were areas where the Cook Islands did receive support from the likes of the Commonwealth Secretariat.
“We have had support from the likes of the Commonwealth Secretariat in the past with things like technical assistance that they provided for us in the early stages of our development of our Seabed Minerals Authority office.”
Republished with permission from the Cook islands News.
As 2024 came to a close and we have stepped into a new year overshadowed by ongoing atrocities, have you stopped to consider how these events are reshaping your world?
Did you notice how your future — and that of generations to come — is being profoundly and irreversibly altered?
The ongoing tragedy in Palestine is not an isolated event. It is a crisis that reverberates far beyond borders, threatening your safety, the well-being of your children and family.
Palestinian advocate Katrina Mitchell-Kouttab . . . a powerful address in Auckland last weekend about how people in New Zealand can help in the face of Israel’s genocide. Image: APR
Even fragile ecosystems and creatures have been obliterated and affected by the fallout from Israel’s chemicals and pollution from its weapons.
The deliberate targeting of civilians, rampant violations of international law, and the obliteration of the rights of children are not distant horrors. They are ominous warnings of a world unravelling — consequences that are slowly seeping into the comfort of your home, threatening the very foundations of the life you thought was secure.
But here’s the hard truth: these outcomes don’t just happen in a a vacuum. They persist because of the silence, indifference, or complicity of those who choose not to act.
The question is, will you stand up for a better future, or will you look away? And how could Palestine possibly affect you and your family? Read on.
Israel acting with impunity for decades
Israel has been acting with impunity for decades, flouting the norms of our legal agreements, defying the United Nations and its rulings and requests to act within the agreed global rules set after the Holocaust and the Nazis disregard for humanity.
The Germans, under Nazi rule, pursued a racist ideology to restructure the world according to race, committing crimes against humanity and war crimes that resulted in a devastating world war and the deaths of millions of people, including millions of Jews. A set of rules were formed from the ashes of these victims to ensure this horror would never happen again. It’s called international law.
However, after the Nazis defeat, it took less than a few years before atrocities began again, perpetrated by the very people who had just been brutally massacred and targeted.
European Jews, including holocaust survivors, armed by Czechoslovakia, funded by the Nazis (Havaara agreement), aided militarily by Britain, the US, Italy and France among others, arrived on foreign shores to a land that did not belong to them.
Once there, they began to disregard the very rules established to protect not only them, but the rest of humanity — rules designed to prevent a repeat of the Holocaust, safeguard against the resurgence of ideologies like Nazism, and ensure impunity for such actions would never occur again.
These rules were a shared commitment by countries to conduct themselves with agreed norms and regulations designed to respect the right of all to live in safety and security, including children, women and civilians in general. Rules that were designed to end war and promote peace, justice, and a better life for all humankind.
Rules written to ensure the sacred understanding, implementation and respect of equal rights for all people, including you, were followed to prevent us from never returning to the lawlessness and terror of World War Two.
But the creation of Israel less than 80 years ago flouted and violated these expectations. The mass murder of children, women and men in Palestine in 1948, which included burning alive Palestinians tied to trees and running them over as they lay unable to move in the middle of town squares, was only the beginning of this disrespectful dehumanisation.
Terrorised by Jewish militia
Jewish militia terrorised Palestinians, lobbing grenades into Palestinian homes where families sheltered in fear, raping women and girls, and forcing every man and boy from whole villages to dig their own trenches before being shot in the back so they fell neatly into their graves.
Pregnant Palestinian women had their bellies sliced open, homes were stolen along with everything in it — including my families — and many family members were murdered.
This included my great grandmother who was shot, execution style, in front of my mother as she carried a small mattress from our home for her grandchildren when they were forcibly displaced. I still don’t know what happened to her body or where she is buried. I do know where our house is still situated in Jerusalem, although currently occupied.
These atrocities enabled Israel’s birth, shameful atrocities behind its creation. There is not one Israeli town or village that is not built on top of a Palestinian village, or town, on the blood and bones of murdered Palestinians, a practice Israel has continued.
As I write, plans to build more illegal settlements on the buried bodies of Palestinians in Gaza have already been drawn up and areas of land pre-sold.
These horrific crimes have continued over decades, becoming worse as Israel perfected and industrialised its ability to exterminate human souls, hearts and lives. Israel’s birth from its inception was only possible through terrorist actions of Jewish militia. These militia Britain designated as terrorist organisations, a designation that still stands today.
Jewish militia such as (Haganah, Irgun and Stern Gang) formed into what is now known as the Israeli Defence Force, although they aren’t defending anything; Palestine was not theirs to take in the first place.
There was never a war of independence for Israel because the state of Israel did not exist to liberate itself from anyone. Instead, Britain illegally handed over land that already belonged to the Palestinians, a peaceful existing people of three pillars of faith — Palestinian Christians Muslims and Jews. If there were any legitimate war of independence, it would be that of the Palestinian people.
Free pass to act above the law
Israel continues to rely on the Holocaust’s memory to give it a free pass to act above the law, threatening world peace and our shared humanity, by using the memory of the horrors of 1945 and the threat of antisemitism to deter people from criticising and speaking out against the state’s unlawful and inhumane actions.
Yet Israel echoes the horrors of Nazi Germany and its destruction with its behaviour, the difference being the industrialisation of mass killing, modern warfare and weapons, the use of AI as a killing machine, the creation of chemical weapons and huge concentration and death camps which far surpass Germany’s capabilities.
Jews around the world have been deeply divided by Israel’s assertion that it represents all Jewish people. Not all Jews religiously and politically support Israel, many do not feel a connection to or support Israel, viewing its actions and policies as separate from their Jewish identity. For them, Israel’s claims do not define what it means to be Jewish, nor do they see its conduct as aligned with Jewish values.
This is not a “Jewish question” but a political one and conflating the two undermines the diverse perspectives within Jewish communities globally and is harmful to Jewish people. It is important to maintain a clear distinction between Judaism and the political actions of Israel.
How does a genocide across the world affect you? The perpetration of genocide and gross violations of human rights, facilitated or supported by Western powers, erodes the very foundations of the global legal framework that protects us all. This assault weakens democracy, undermines international law, and destabilises the structures you rely on for a secure future.
“The perpetration of genocide and gross violations of human rights, facilitated or supported by Western powers, erodes the very foundations of the global legal framework that protects us all.” Image: Al Jazeera headline APR
It leaves your defences crumbling, your safety compromised, and your vulnerabilities exposed to the chaos that follows such lawlessness as a global citizen of this world under the same protections and with the same equality as the Palestinians.
Palestinian children are no less deserving of safety and rights than any other children. When their rights are ignored and violated, it undermines protections for children worldwide, creating a precedent of vulnerability and injustice. If violations are deemed acceptable for some, they risk becoming acceptable for all.
Sitting safely in Aotearoa does not guarantee protection. The actions of Israel and the US, Western countries — massacring and flattening entire neighbourhoods — send a dangerous message that such horrors are only for “others”, for “brown people” who speak a different language.
But Western countries are the global minority. Many nations now view the West with growing disdain, especially in light of Israel and America’s actions, coupled with the glaring double standards and inaction of the West, including New Zealand, as they stand by and witness a genocide in progress.
When children become a legitimate target, the safety of all children is compromised. Your kids are at risk too. Just because you live on the other side of the world does not mean you are immune or beyond the reach of those who see such actions as justification for retaliation.
If such disregard for human life is deemed acceptable for one people, it will inevitably become acceptable for others. Justice and equality must extend to all children, regardless of nationality, to ensure a safer world for everyone.
But why should you care? Because Israel and the US are undermining the framework that protects you. Israel’s violations of International and humanitarian law including laws on occupation, war crimes and bombing protected institutions such as hospitals, schools, UN facilities, civilian homes and areas of safety, undermines these and sets a dangerous precedent for others to follow. Israel does not respect global peace, civilians, human rights nor has respect for life outside of its own. This lawlessness and lack of accountability is already giving other states the green light to erode the norms that protect human rights, including the decimation of the rights of the child.
The West’s support for Israel, namely the US, the UK, Canada, much of Europe, Australia and New Zealand, despite its clear violations of international law, exposes a fundamental hypocrisy. This weakens the credibility of democratic nations that claim to champion human rights and justice.
The failure of institutions like the UN to hold Israel accountable erodes trust in these bodies, fostering widespread disillusionment and scepticism about their ability to address other global conflicts. This has already fuelled an “us versus them” mentality, deepening the divide between the Global South and the Global North.
This division is marked by growing disrespect for Western governments and their citizens, who demand moral authority and adherence to the rule of law from nations in the East and South yet allow one of their “own” to brazenly violate these principles.
This hypocrisy undermines the hope for a new, respectful world order envisioned after the Holocaust, leaving it damaged and discredited.
Israel, despite its claims, has no authentic ties to the Middle East. What was once Palestinian land deeply rooted in Middle Eastern culture, has been overtaken and reshaped into to an artificial state imposed by mixed European heritage. It now stands as a Western outpost in stark contrast and isolated from surrounding Eastern cultures.
The failure of the West and the international community to stop the Palestinian genocide has begun a new period of genocide normalisation, where it becomes acceptable to watch children being blown up, women and men being murdered, shot and starved to death.
This acceptance then becomes a part of a country’s statecraft. Palestinian genocide, while it might be a little “uncomfortable” for many, has still been tolerable. If genocide is tolerable for one, then its tolerable for another.
Bias and prejudice
If you can comfortably go about your day, knowing the horror other innocent human beings are facing then perhaps it might be time to reflect on and confront any underlying biases or prejudices you hold.
An interesting thought experiment is to transform and transfer what is happening in Palestine to New Zealand.
Imagine Nelson being completely flattened, and all the inhabitants of Auckland, plus some, being starved to death.
Imagine all New Zealand hospitals being destroyed, Wellington hospital with its patients still inside is blown up. All the babies in the neonatal unit are left to die and rot in their incubators, patients in the ICU units and those immobile or too sick to move are also left to die, this includes all children unable to walk in the Starship hospital.
Electricity for the whole country is turned off and all patients and healthcare workers are forced to leave at gunpoint. New Zealand doctors and nurses are stripped down to their underwear and tortured, this includes rape, and some male doctors are left to die bleeding in the street after being raped to death with metal poles and electrodes.
Water is then shut down and unavailable to all of you. You cannot feed your family, your grandchildren, your parents, your siblings, your best friends.
Imagine New Zealanders burying bodies of their children and loved ones in makeshift mass graves, while living in tents and then being subjected to chemical weapon strikes, quad copters or small drones’ attacks that drop bombs and exterminate, shooting people as they try to find food, but targeting mostly women and children.
Imagine every single human being in Upper Hutt completely wiped out. Imagine 305 New Zealand school buses full of dead children line the streets, that’s more than 11,000 killed so far. Each day more than 10 New Zealand kids lose a limb, including your children.
This number starts to increase with the hope to finally ethnically cleanse Aotearoa to make way for a new state defined by one religion and one ethnicity that isn’t yours, by a new group of people from the other side of the world.
These people, called settlers, are given weapons to hurt and kill New Zealanders as they rampage through towns evicting residents and moving into your homes taking everything that belongs to you and leaving you on the street. All your belongings, all your memories, your pets, your future, your family are stolen or destroyed.
Starting from January 2025, up to 15 New Zealanders will die of starvation or related diseases EVERY DAY until the rest of the world decides if it will come to your aid with this lawlessness. Or maybe you will die in desperation while others watch you on their TV screens or scroll through their social media seeing you as the “terrorist” and the invaders as the “victims”.
If this thought horrifies you, if it makes you feel shocked or upset, then so too should others having to endure such illegal horrors. None of what is happening is acceptable, as a fellow human being you should be fighting for the right of all of us. Perhaps you might think of our own tangata whenua and Aotearoa’s own history.
What could this mean for New Zealand?
We are not creating a bright future for a country like New Zealand, whose remote location, dependence on trade, and its aging infrastructure, leaves it vulnerable to changing global dynamics. This is especially concerning with our energy dependence on imported oil, our dependence on global supply chains for essential goods including medicine (Israel’s pager attack against Hezbollah has compromised supply chains in a dangerous and horrific violation that New Zealand ignored), our economic marginalisation, and our security challenges.
All of this while surrounded by rising tensions between superpowers like the US and China which will affect New Zealand’s security and economic partnerships. Balancing economic and political ties is complicated by this government’s focus on strengthening strategic alliances with Western nations, mainly the US, whose complicity in genocide, war crimes, and disrespect for the rule of law is weakening its standing and threatens its very future.
Targeting marginalised groups
The precedent set in Palestine will embolden oppressive regimes elsewhere to target minority groups, knowing that the world will turn a blind eye. Israel is a violent, oppressive apartheid state, operating outside of international law and norms and has been compared to, but is much worse than the former apartheid South Africa.
This will have a huge impact felt all over the world with the continued refugee crisis. Multicultural nations such as New Zealand will struggle to cope with the support needed for the families of our citizens in need.
An increase of the far right reminiscent of Nazi ideology and extremism
Israel is a pariah state fuelled by radicalisation and extremism with an intolerance to different races, colour and ethnicity and indigenous populations. This has created a fertile ground for extremist ideologies, destabilising regions far beyond the Middle East as we have seen in Europe with the rejuvenation of the far-right movement.
Israel’s genocidal onslaughts will continue to be the cause for ongoing instability in the region, affecting global energy supplies, trade routes, and security. The Palestinian crisis will not be answered with violence, oppression and war. We aren’t going anywhere, and neither should we.
Weaponising aid and healthcare
Israel’s deliberate restriction of food, water, and medical supplies to Gaza weaponises humanitarian aid, violating basic principles of humanity. A new weapon in the arsenal of pariah states and radical violent countries and a new Israeli tactic to be copied and used elsewhere. Targeting hospitals, healthcare workers, distribution centres, ambulances, the UN, and collectively punishing whole populations has never been and will never be acceptable.
If it is not acceptable that this happens to you in Aotearoa, then nor is it acceptable for Palestinians in Palestine. It is intolerable for other “terror regimes” to commit such acts, so why is it deemed acceptable when carried out by Israel and the US?
Undermining the rights to free speech, peaceful protest and freedoms
During the covid pandemic, many New Zealanders were concerned with government-imposed restrictions that could be used disproportionately or as pretexts for authoritarian control. This included limitations on freedom of movement, speech, assembly, and privacy.
And yet Palestinians endure military checkpoints, curfews, restricted movement within and between their own territories, and the suppression of their right to protest or voice opposition to occupation — all due to Israel’s oppressive and illegal control. This is further enabled by the political cover and tacit support provided by this government’s failure to speak out and strongly condemn Israel’s actions.
Through its failure to take meaningful action or fulfil its third-party state obligations, this government continues to maintain normal relations with Israel across diplomatic, cultural, economic, and social spheres, as well as through trade. Moreover, it wrongly asserts on its official foreign affairs websites and policies that an occupying power has the right to self-defence against a defenceless population it has systematically abused and terrorised for decades.
The silencing of pro-Palestinian activists and criminalisation of humanitarian aid also create a chilling effect, discouraging global solidarity movements and undermining the moral fabric of societies. The use of victimhood to shroud the aggressor and blame the victim is a low point in our harrowed history. As is the vilification of moral activism and those that dare to stand against the illegal and sickening mass killing of civilians.
The attempt to persecute brave students standing up to Zionist and Israeli-run organisations and those supporting Israel (including academic and cultural institutions), by both trigger-happy billionaire Jewish investors and elite families and company investors whose answer to peaceful resistance is violence, demonstrates how far we have fallen from democracy and the rights of the citizen.
I find it completely bizarre that standing up against a genocide of helpless, unarmed civilians is demonised in order to protect the thugs, criminals and psychopaths that make up the Israeli state and its criminal actors, and the elite families and corporations profiting from this war.
Even here in Aotearoa, protesters have been vilified for drawing attention to Israel’s war crimes and double standards at the ASB Classic tennis tournament. Letting into New Zealand an IDF soldier who is associated with an institution directly implicated in war crimes and crimes against humanity should be questioned.
These protesters were falsely labelled as “pro-Hamas” by Israeli and Western media. They were portrayed negatively, seen as a nuisance. Their messages about supporting human rights and stopping a horrific genocide from continuing were not mentioned.
The focus was the effect their chants had on the tennis match and the Israeli tennis player, who was upset. Exercising their legal rights to demonstrate, the protesters were not a security issue. Yet Lina Glushko, the Israeli tennis player, claimed she needed extra security to combat a dozen protesters, many over the age of 60, who were never in any proximity of the controversial player nor were ever a threat.
No mention that Lina Glushko lives in an illegal settlement in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, or that she was in service from 2018-2020 during the Great March of Return. Or that this tennis player has made public statements mocking the suffering of Palestinians, inconsistent with Aotearoa’s commitment to combating hate speech and promoting inclusivity and respect.
Her presence erodes the integrity of international sports and sends a dangerous message that war crimes and human rights violations carry no meaningful consequences despite international law and the recent UNGA (UN General Assembly) and ICJ (International Court of Justice) resolutions and advisory opinions.
Allowing IDF soldiers entry into New Zealand disregards the pain and suffering of Palestinians and the New Zealand Palestinian community, dehumanising their plight. It sends a message of complicity to the broader international community, one that was ignored by most Western media.
Similarly, Israel’s attempts to not just control the Western media but to shut down and kill journalists, is not only a war crime, but is terrifying. Journalists’ protection is enshrined in international law due to the essential nature of their work in fostering accountability, transparency, and justice. They expose corruption, war crimes, and human rights abuses. Real journalism is vital for democracy, ensuring citizens are informed about government actions and global events.
Israel’s targeting of journalists undermines the rule of law and emboldens it and other perpetrators to commit further atrocities without fear of scrutiny or consequences.
The suffering of Palestinians is a human rights issue that transcends borders. Allowing genocide and oppression to continue undermines the shared humanity that binds us all.
Israel’s actions reflect the dehumanisation of an entire population and our failure to enforce accountability for these crimes weakens international systems designed to protect your family and you.
Israel’s influence is far reaching, and New Zealand is not immune. Any undue influence by foreign states, including Israel, threatens New Zealand’s sovereignty and ability to make independent decisions in its national interest. Lobbying efforts by organisations like the Zionist Federation or the Jewish National Fund (JNF), the Jewish Council and the Holocaust Centre of New Zealand push policies that do not align with New Zealand’s broader public interest.
Aligning with a state that is violating rights and in a court of law on charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, leaves citizens wide open to the same controls and concerns we are now seeing Americans and Europeans face at the mercy of AIPAC and Israeli influence.
Palestine is a test of the international community’s commitment to justice, human rights, and the rule of law. If Israel is allowed to continue acting with impunity, the global system that protects us all will be irreparably weakened, paving the way for more injustice, oppression, and chaos. It is a fight for the moral and legal foundations of the world we live in and ignoring it will have far-reaching consequences for everyone.
So, as you usher in 2025, don’t sit there and clink your glasses, hoping for a better year while continuing to ignore the suffering around you. Act to make 2025 better than the horrific few years the world has been subjected to, if not for humanity, then for yourself and your family’s future. Start with the biggest threat to world peace and stability — Israel and US hegemony.
What you can do
You can make a difference in the fight against Israel’s illegal occupation and violations of human rights, including the deliberate targeting of children by taking simple yet impactful steps. Here’s how you can start today:
Boycott products supporting oppression:
Remove at least five products from your weekly supermarket shopping list that are linked to companies supporting Israel’s occupation or that are made in Israel. Use tools like the “No Thanks” app to identify these items or visit the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) website for detailed advice and information.
Hold the government accountable:
Write letters to your government representatives demanding action to uphold democracy and human rights. Remind them of New Zealand’s obligations under international law to stand against human rights abuses and violations of global norms. Demand fair and equitable foreign policies designed to protect us all.
Educate yourself:
Learn about the history of the Palestine-Israel conflict, especially the events of 1948, to better understand the roots of the ongoing crisis. Knowledge is a powerful tool for advocacy and change.
Seek alternative news sources:
Expand your perspective by accessing a wide range of news sources including from platforms such as Al Jazeera, Double Down News, and Middle East Eye.
Be a citizen, not a bystander:
Passive spectatorship allows injustice to thrive. Take a stand. Whether by boycotting, writing letters, educating yourself, or raising awareness, your actions can contribute to a global movement for justice for us all.
Together, we can challenge systems of oppression and demand accountability for crimes against humanity. Let 2025 not just be another year of witnessing suffering but one where we collectively take action to restore justice, uphold humanity, and demand accountability.
The time to act is now.
Fiji’s Office of the President has confirmed that the Tribunal’s report on allegations of misconduct against suspended Director of Public Prosecutions Christopher Pryde does not need to be made public at this stage.
The tribunal, chaired by Justice Anare Tuilevuka with Justices Chaitanya Lakshman and Samuela Qica, has completed its inquiry and submitted its findings to the President, Ratu Naiqama Lalabalavu.
The President will review the report, conduct consultations, and seek necessary advice before releasing it.
Due to holiday leave, this process will continue in the New Year.
“It is acknowledged that the Report does not need to be made public as required in section 112(6) of the Constitution, and His Excellency will do so as soon as he has properly considered it.”
New Zealander Pryde had formally written to the Office of the President, requesting that a copy of the report be made available to him.
Position and pay ‘in limbo’
An earlier Fiji Times report by Shal Devi said Pryde had written to the Office of the President to request an urgent conclusion of the matter that had left his position and pay in limbo.
Pryde was suspended in April 2023 because of allegations of misbehaviour, which were linked to him being photographed with former attorney-general Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum — who was under investigation at the time — at a diplomatic gathering.
Earlier this week, Pryde made public the letter he had written to the Office of the President.
“I have been informed that the tribunal report into allegations of misbehaviour against me was provided to His Excellency, the President, on Monday the 23rd December 2024,” he wrote.
“I have written to the tribunal for a copy of the report, and they have advised me to contact the President’s office directly. I am therefore formally requesting that a copy of the report is provided to me.”
Pryde cited section 112 (6) of the Constitution, which states that the report shall be made public. Pryde said this was a mandatory provision and was not subject to discretion.
“I also note that section 112 (3) (c) of the Constitution provides that the President must act on the advice of the tribunal and that section 112 (5) provides that the suspension shall cease if the President determines that the judicial officer should not be removed.
“In other words, if the report advises that there is insufficient evidence of misbehaviour, then the suspension should be lifted immediately and I should be reinstated to my position as the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).”
Pryde said it had been close to 21 months since he was suspended as the DPP, and nearly six months since his salary was suspended, which had caused him great financial hardship.
“It is a matter of urgency that this matter is brought to a final conclusion since the tribunal has now completed its task.
“I am therefore kindly requesting that His Excellency (i) advise me of the outcome of the report, (ii) provide me a copy of the report and allow it to be published, and (iii), if there is no evidence or insufficient evidence to support the allegations of misbehaviour, lift my suspension as is required under the Constitution and immediately reinstate my salary and entitlements.”
Republished from The Fiji Times with permission.
This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.
Virgin Australia has confirmed a “serious security incident” with its flight crew members who were in Fiji on New Year’s Day.
Virgin Australia’s chief operating officer Stuart Aggs said the incident took place on Tuesday night – New Year’s Eve
The crew members were in Fiji on night layover.
Fiji police said two crew members had alleged they were raped while out clubbing and one alleged her phone had been stolen.
They had gone out to a nightclub in Martintar.
“I’m sorry to advise of a serious security incident which affected a number of crew in Nadi, Fiji, on Tuesday evening,” said Aggs on New Year’s Day.
“Our immediate priority is to look after the wellbeing of our crew involved and make sure they are supported. The safety and welfare of our people is our number one priority.”
Virgin Australia has kept the crew members in Nadi as police investigations continue.
An emergency 231 million euro (NZ$428 million) French aid package for New Caledonia has been reduced by one third because of the French Pacific territory’s current political crisis.
The initial French package was endorsed in early December 2024, in an 11th-hour vote at the French National Assembly, minutes before French Prime Minister Michel Barnier and his government fell in a motion of no confidence.
The “end of management 2024” bill amounted to 231 million euros, specifically to allow New Caledonia’s essential public services to keep operating in the next few weeks.
Domino effect
Since the government led by Louis Mapou was toppled on Christmas Eve, pro-independence MPs at the Congress refused to take part in further votes.
They did not turn up on the Boxing Day sitting on Thursday, December 26.
This made it impossible for Congress to endorse the third and last tranche of the reforms, which were a precondition to the last third of the French aid package.
Outgoing New Caledonia President Louis Mapou . . . tensions have come to a head between the territory’s Congress and government since the deadly pro-independence riots began in May. Image: New Caledonia govt/RNZ Pacific
Letter from Bayrou and Valls In a letter received by New Caledonia’s MPs at the weekend, both new French Prime Minister François Bayrou and his new Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls explained the failure for New Caledonia’s Congress to endorse the last third of the demanded reform package.
It means the whole package of 231 million euros will not be paid in full, and that one third of the total will have to wait until this year.
French Minister for Overseas Manuel Valls . . . letter of explanation. Image: RNZ Pacific
The confirmed amount, for the time being, is now 154 million euros (NZ$285 million) which will go towards New Caledonia’s Provinces and municipalities (125 million euros — NZ$231 million).
The remaining 29 million euros (NZ$54 million) will be paid and used for the payment of New Caledonia’s unemployment benefits and to allow the French Pacific territory’s power company, ENERCAL, which is on the brink of collapse without immediate assistance.
77 million euros withheld “The last third of the initial 231 million euros package for New Caledonia (77 million euros [NZ$143 million]) will be released in 2025, once the pre-condition as stipulated in the initial agreement, regarding a reform of the TGC (General Consumption Tax, a local equivalent of a VAT) is adopted by (New Caledonia’s) Congress. Failing that, it will not,” Bayrou and Valls explained in the same letter.
They further wrote that those reforms were “indispensable” to ensure “visibility and stability” for New Caledonia’s “economic stakeholders and more generally to all of New Caledonians at a time when a dialogue is supposed to take place on its institutional future.”
The bloc resignation from Calédonie Ensemble entails that the whole government of New Caledonia is deemed to have resigned and acts in a caretaker mode until the inception of a new government.
New Caledonia’s Congress has been convened for a special sitting next week on 7 January 2025 to elect a new government, under the principle of proportional representation and a spirit of “collegiality”.
One particular point of contention was Mapou’s efforts to secure a loan of up to 1 billion euros from France, under a ‘PS2R’ (reconstruction, refoundation and salvage) plan to rebuild New Caledonia after the riots’ damage (estimated at some 2.2 billion euros) and the subsequent thousands of job losses.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
The Governor of the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas has paid tribute to former US President Jimmy Carter who died yesterday.
“Carter played a pivotal role in the historic establishment of the CNMI as a Commonwealth in political union with the United States,” Governor Arnold Palacios said.
He said that on 24 October 1977, Carter signed the proclamation affirming the full force and effect of the Northern Mariana Islands Constitution, a landmark moment in the territory’s history.
CNMI’s Governor Arnold Palacios . . . paid tribute to former US President Jimmy Carter for his dedication to humanity, peace, and service. Image: RNZ Pacific/Mark Rabago
Governor Palacios and Lieutenant-Governor David Apatang both said the CNMI honoured Carter not only for his role in shaping the political landscape of the CNMI, but also for his unwavering dedication to humanity, peace, and service.
The CNMI’s outgoing Congressman Gregorio Kilili Sablan also paid tribute to Carter in a statement.
“Appreciating his long life and service, Andrea and I mourn the passing of Jimmy Carter. Guided by his faith, Carter lived an exemplary life worthy of imitation,” he said.
US Congress Delegate Gregorio Kilili Sablan . . . “Carter lived an exemplary life worthy of imitation.” Image: USDA/Lance Cheung/RNZ Pacific
It is a sentiment shared by Sablan’s successor, Delegate-elect Kimberlyn King-Kinds.
‘Profound sadness’
“It is with profound sadness that we like the rest of the world mourn the passing of Jimmy Carter, a true servant leader whose life exemplified humility, compassion, and unwavering dedication to the betterment of humanity.
“From his leadership in the White House to his tireless efforts with Habitat for Humanity and global peace initiatives, President Carter’s legacy of service will forever inspire us. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Carter family and all who were touched by his remarkable life. May he rest in eternal peace,” King-Kinds said.
American Samoa’s Delegate to Washington, Uifa’atali Amata Radewagen also shared her memories of Carter.
“I have fond memories of the entire Carter family from the time President Jimmy Carter sent his son Jeff and daughter-in-law Annette to Pago Pago.
“Carter designated them as his personal representatives to the first inaugural of an elected Governor of American Samoa, Uifa’atali Peter Coleman.
US Congresswoman Aumua Amata Radewagen . . . “I have fond memories of the entire Carter family.” Image: radewagen.house.gov/RNZ Pacific
“My Dad had me show them around part of that time, as did others, and in turn, they invited my husband Fred and me for private dinner in the White House family quarters.
“This was a particularly generous act on their part to allow us in the areas that few people get to see, including guiding us through the Map room, the famous Lincoln bedroom, Queen’s bedroom and third floor.
“While we were there, President Carter and First Lady Rosalynn Carter arrived and very kindly greeted us.”
Radewagen said that personal kindness was forever part of President Carter’s lasting legacy.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
A Palestine solidarity group has protested over the participation of Israeli tennis player Lina Glushko in New Zealand’s ASB Tennis Classic in Auckland this week, saying such competition raises serious concerns about the normalisation of systemic oppression and apartheid.
The Palestine Forum of New Zealand said in a statement that by taking part in the event Glushko, a former Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) soldier, was sending a “troubling message that undermines the values of justice, equality, and human rights”.
In the past 15 months, Israel’s military has killed almost 45,500 people in the besieged enclave of Gaza, mostly women and children.
Since the court ruling in July, Israel has intensified attacks on the civilian population in Gaza and their natural resources and infrastructure, including hospitals and health clinics.
“Welcoming Israeli athletes to Aotearoa is not a neutral act. It normalises the systemic injustices perpetrated by the Israeli state against Palestinians,” said Maher Nazzal of the Palestine Forum.
“Just as the international sports community united to oppose South Africa’s apartheid in the 20th century, we must now stand firm against Israel’s ongoing violations of international law and human rights.”
Implements apartheid policies
He said former soldier Glushko symbolised a regime that:
Implements apartheid policies: As documented by leading organisations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch;
Operates under leadership accused of war crimes: With an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant issued against Israeli officials; and
Continues its illegal occupation of Palestine: In direct violation of international law and countless United Nations resolutions.
The statement said: “While sports often aim to transcend politics, they cannot be isolated from the realities of injustice and oppression.
“By welcoming athletes representing an apartheid regime, we risk ignoring the voices of the oppressed and allowing sports to be used as a tool for whitewashing human rights abuses.
“We urge the international and local sports community to remain consistent in their principles by refusing to host representatives of regimes that perpetuate apartheid.
“The global boycott of South African athletes during apartheid proved that sports can be a powerful force for change. The same principle must apply today.”
On a sticky day in January, dozens of nannies and aunties from Tainui shook and waved fronds of greenery as they called manuhiri onto Tuurangawaewae Marae.
More than 10,000 people had responded to a rare call for unity from the Māori King to discuss what the new government’s policies meant for Māori. It set the scene for what became a massive year for te ao Māori.
The agreements included either rolling back previous initiatives considered progressive for Māori or creating new policies that many in Māoridom and beyond perceived to be an attack on Māori rights and te Tiriti o Waitangi.
So as the rest of the country wound down for the year, te ao Māori went to work, planning for the year ahead.
This year saw everything from controversial debates about the place of New Zealand’s founding document to mourning the loss of the Māori king, and a viral haka.
A call for unity — how 2024 started The Hui-aa-motu in January was the first sign of the year to come.
Iwi from across the motu arrived at Tūrangawaewae, including Ngāpuhi, an iwi which doesn’t typically follow the Kiingitanga, suggesting a growing sense of shared purpose in Māoridom.
At the centre of the discussions was the ACT Party’s Treaty Principles Bill, which aims to redefine the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi and enshrine them in law.
Māori also expressed their concerns over the axing of Te Aka Whai Ora, (the Māori Health Authority), the re-introduction of referenda on Māori wards, removing references to Tiriti o Waitangi in legislation, and policies related to the use and funding of te reo Māori.
The day was overwhelmingly positive. Visitors were treated with manaakitanga, all receiving packed lunches and ice blocks to ward off the heat.
Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau te Wherowhero VII addresses the crowd at Hui-ā-Motu last January. Image: Ella Stewart/RNZ
Other than the sheer number of people who showed up, the hui was memorable for these words, spoken by Kiingi Tuheitia as he addressed the crowds, and quoted repeatedly as the year progressed:
“The best protest we can make right now is being Māori. Be who we are. Live our values. Speak our reo. Care for our mokopuna, our awa, our maunga.
“Just be Māori. Be Māori all day, every day. We are here. We are strong.”
The momentum continued, with the mauri of Hui-ā-Motu passed to Rātana pā next, and then to Waitangi in February.
The largest Waitangi in years Waitangi Day has long been a place of activism and discussion, and this year was no exception.
February saw the most well-attended Waitangi in years. Traffic in and out of Paihia was at a standstill for hours as people flocked to the historic town, to discuss, protest, and commemorate the country’s founding document.
Māori activist and former MP for Te Tai Tokerau, Hone Harawira. Image: Angus Dreaver/RNZ
Veteran Māori activist Hone Harawira addressed David Seymour, the architect of the controversial Treaty Principles Bill and ACT Party Leader, directly.
“You want to gut the treaty? In front of all of these people? Hell no! You and your shitty-arse bill are going down the toilet.”
A new activist group, ‘Toitū te Tiriti’, also seized the moment to make themselves known.
Organisers Eru Kapa-Kingi and Hohepa Thompson led two dozen protesters onto the atea (courtyard) of Te Whare Rūnanga during the pōwhiri for government officials, peacefully singing over David Seymour’s speech.
“Whakarongo, e noho . . .” they began — “Listen, sit down”.
Hīkoi organiser and spokesperson for activist group Toitū te Tiriti, Eru Kapa-Kingi at Waitangi commemorations in February 2024. Image: Angus Dreaver/RNZ
It was just the start of a movement which led to a nationwide hīkoi from the top of the North Island to Wellington.
Record number of urgent Waitangi Tribunal claims In the past year, the government’s policies have faced significant formal scrutiny too, with a record number of urgent claims heard before the Waitangi Tribunal in such a short period of time.
The claims have been wide-ranging and contentious, including:
the disestablishment of the Māori Health Authority,
ACT’s Treaty Principles Bill,
limiting te reo Māori use,
reinstating referendums for Māori wards, and
the repeal of smokefree legislation.
Seymour has also criticised the function of the tribunal itself. In May, he argued it had become “increasing activist”, going “well beyond its brief”.
“The tribunal appears to regard itself as a parallel government that can intervene in the actual government’s policy-making process,” Seymour said.
The government has made no secret of its plan to review the tribunal’s future role, a coalition promise.
The review is expected to refocus the tribunal’s scope, purpose and nature back to its “original intent”. While the government has not yet released any specific details about the review, it’s anticipated that Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka will oversee it.
Te Kiingi o te Kōtahitanga — mourning the loss of Kiingi Tuheitia In August, when the seas were choppy, te ao Māori lost a rangatira.
Once again, thousands arrived outside the bright-red, ornately-carved gates of Tuurangawaewae, waiting to say one last goodbye.
The tangi, which lasted five days, saw tears, laughter and plenty of stories about Tuheitia, who has been called “Te Kiingi o Te Kōtahitanga”, the King of Unity.
Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII’s body is transferred to a hearse. Image: Layla Bailey-McDowell/RNZ
On the final day, led by Kaihaka, his body was driven the two blocks in a black hearse to the banks of Waikato River. He was placed on a waka specially crafted for him, and made the journey to his final resting place at the top of Taupiri Maunga, alongside his tūpuna.
At just 27 years old, the new Kuini signals a societal shift, where a new generation of rangatahi who know their whakapapa, their reo, and are strong in their identity as Māori, are now stepping up.
The new generation of Māori activists An example of this “kohanga generation” is Aotearoa’s youngest MP, Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke.
Te Pāti Māori MP Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke won the Hauraki-Waikato seat over Labour MP Nanaia Mahuta in 2023. Image: Samuel Rillstone/RNZ
Maipi-Clarke and several other opposition MPs performed the Ka Mate haka in response to the Treaty Principles Bill, a move that cost her a 24-hour suspension from the debating chamber.
At the same time, another up-and-coming leader within Māoridom, Eru Kapa-Kingi, led a hīkoi from the top of the North Island to Wellington, in what is believed to be the largest protest to ever arrive at Parliament.
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has announced that he will not be travelling to the Treaty grounds in Northland for Waitangi Day commemorations in February next year, opting to attend events elsewhere.
Māori met the decision with mixed emotions — some calling it a missed opportunity, and others pleased.
New Overseas Minister Manuel Valls, who was appointed yesterday as part of the new French government of Prime Minister François Bayrou, intends to tackle New Caledonia’s numerous issues in the spirit of dialogue of former Socialist Prime Minister Michel Rocard.
Rocard is credited as the main French negotiator in talks between pro-France and pro-independence leaders that led in 1988 to the “Matignon-Oudinot” agreements that put an end to half a decade of quasi-civil war.
At the time 26 years old, Valls was a young adviser in Rocard’s team.
Valls said Rocard’s dialogue-based approach remained his “political DNA”.
36 years later, now 62, he told French national broadcasters France Inter and Outre-mer la Première that the two priorities were economic recovery (after destructive riots and damage in May 2024, estimated at some 2.2 billion Euros), as well as resuming political dialogue between local antagonistic parties concerning New Caledonia’s political future.
On the economic side, short-lived former Prime Minister Michel Barnier had committed up to one billion Euros in loans for New Caledonia’s recovery.
But France’s Parliament has not yet endorsed its 2025 budget, “which poses a number of problems regarding commitments made by (Barnier).
On the political talks that were expected to start a lead to a comprehensive and inclusive agreement between France, the pro-independence and pro-France camps, Valls said his approach was “dialogue” with the view of “going forward.”
“We don’t have much time (…) We have to find a common path”, he said, adding future political solutions should be “innovative” for the French Pacific archipelago.
Initial schedules for those talks to take place foresaw an agreement to arrive some time at the end of March 2025.
But no talks have started yet.
The Union Calédonienne (UC), one of the main components of the pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS), said nothing could happen until it holds its annual congress, sometime during the “second half of January 2025”.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Israel kills the journalists deliberately. This is unprecedented. The Western media — including here in Aotearoa New Zealand — kills the truth about genocide in Gaza.
The journalists from the Al-Quds Today TV channel were outside the al-Awada Hospital in the Nuseirat refugee camp when their satellite broadcast van was struck by a pre-dawn Israeli strike.
Video footage that went viral showed the van with the words “PRESS” clearly marked in red block letters engulfed in flames.
The slain journalists were – let’s honour their names — Fadi Hassouna, Ibrahim al-Sheikh Ali, Mohammed al-Ladah, Faisal Abu al-Qumsan and Ayman al-Jadi.
Jadi had gone to the hospital with his wife who was giving birth to their first child. He had gone out to check on the car and his mates when it was bombed.
Baby born on day father died for ‘truth’
Imagine that, the baby was born on the very day his father died while doing his job as a journalist — reporting the truth.
It is another cruel example of the tragic lives lost in this genocide by Israel which has killed more than 45,400 people, mostly women and children.
Al Jazeera’s report on the journalist killings. Video: AJ
Just last week, four other journalists were killed over two days. And now the total is 201 Palestinian journalists killed since 7 October 2023.
This is by far the highest death toll of journalists in any war or conflict.
And in 20 years of the Vietnam War, just 63 journalists were killed.
Al Jazeera reports that Israel, which has not allowed foreign journalists to enter Gaza except on military embeds with the Israeli “Defence” Forces (IDF), which is increasingly being dubbed by critics as the Israeli “Offence” Forces (“IOF”), has been condemned by many media freedom organisations.
Samoan Palestine decolonisation activist Michel Mulipola . . . speaking at today’s Auckland rally about the 95th anniversary of the Black Saturday Mau massacre by NZ forces in Samoa. Image: APR
Gaza ‘most dangerous region’
The besieged enclave is now regarded as the “most dangerous region of the world” for journalists, according to Reporters Without Borders in its annual report.
New Zealand journalist and author Dr David Robie . . . critical of New Zealand media’s role over the Gaza genocide. Image: Del Abcede/APR
Al Jazeera itself was banned by Israel in May from reporting within the country, and was subsequently barred from reporting within the occupied West Bank and the closure of the Ramallah bureau in mid-September.
Israel has tried to silence Al Jazeera previously in by threatening it in 2017, bombing its broadcast office in Gaza in 2021, and assassinating celebrated journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in 2022 and other reporters with impunity.
Al Jazeera, TRT News and many independent news outlets as Democracy Now!, The Intercept, Middle East Eye and The Palestine Chronicle stand in contrast to mainstream media such as BBC, CNN, The New York Times, and The Washington Post that have frequently been called out in investigative reports for systemic bias against Palestine.
Among the poignant messages from Palestinian journalists documenting this war are Bisan Owda, who signs on her video reports every day with “I’m still alive”.
But I would like to share this reflection from another journalist, videographer Osama Abu Rabee who says on his X news feed that he is “capturing the untold stories of resilience and hope”. He said in one post this week:
Kia Ora Gaza facilitator Roger Fowler (in hat) . . . a tribute for his many years of support for the Palestine freedom cause. Image: APR
‘Moments away from death’
“One of my most vivid memories is when three journalists and I were in Eastern Jabalia and we needed to connect our e-sims to edit and upload content of a massacre.
“We went to a room but the connection wasn’t good so I suggested we go into another room. Less than 5 minutes later, the room we had been in got bombed.
“People came over running thinking that we were killed but luckily there were only injuries.
“This was one of the many times that I was moments away from death. I know that I’m targeted as a Palestinian but also as a journalist.
“Every single day I step out of my house and put on my ‘press’ vest and I look behind at my family, I’m not sure if I’ll see them again.
“I hope you understand the risks we are taking to show you the truth.
“Even 15 month later, we continue to go out every single day and document the horrors that people in Gaza experience.
“We do this so that when God asks what you do, we respond with ‘we did what we could’.”
NZ media’s role shameful
Can journalists and the media in Aotearoa New Zealand say with hand on heart that “we did what we could” in the face of this genocide?
Palestinian advocate Katrina Mitchell-Kouttab . . . powerful address in how people in New Zealand can help in the face of Israel’s genocide. Image: APR
Of course not, the role of New Zealand media has been shameful, apart from notable exceptions such as Gordon Campbell.
It has failed to hold the Christopher Luxon coalition government to account over its pathetic inaction over the genocide.
It has failed to press the government into taking a stronger and more principled stance at the United Nations to call for sanctions against the apartheid and genocidal regime, or to even expel Israel from the global chamber — or the ambassador from Wellington.
Take Ireland, a smallish country like New Zealand, as an inspirational example. Earlier this month, Ireland responded immediately to the closure of Israel’s embassy in Dublin by opening a Palestinian museum on the premises.
Prime Minister Simon Harris condemned Israel’s genocidal actions, particularly against children and reaffirmed his country’s commitment to human rights and international law.
“You know what I think is reprehensible? Killing children, I think that’s reprehensible.
“You know what I think is reprehensible? Seeing the scale of civilian deaths that we’ve seen in Gaza.
“You know what I think is reprehensible? People being left to starve and humanitarian aid not flowing,”
Silence of the news media
Have we ever had such a courageous statement like this from our Prime Minister. Absolutely not.
It is shameful that our government has not taken a stand.
And it is shameful that the New Zealand media has been so silent over this most horrendous episode of our times — genocide, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity in front of our very eyes for 15 months.
To my knowledge, journalists in Aotearoa have not made even made statements of solidarity with the journalists of Gaza and their horrific sacrifice to bear witness to the truth.
New Zealand journalists have already “normalised” the genocide. Shameful.
Dr David Robie is convenor of Pacific Media Watch and editor of Asia Pacific Report. This was first presented as an address to a Palestinian solidarity rally in Aotearoa New Zealand’s Te Komititanga Square in Auckland Tāmaki Makaurau on 28 December 2024.
A banner condemning New Zealand media for being “silent and complicit” over Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Image: APR
Fiji MP Lynda Tabuya has been dismissed as the country’s Minister for Women, Children and Social Protection.
Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka said in a statement that in light of the recent events concerning the conduct of Lynda Tabuya, and in consideration of:
the Oath she has taken as a Minister; and
standards expected of any Minister
He had decided to exercise the power conferred upon to him by Section 92(3)(b) of the Constitution, to dismiss her as a minister, with immediate effect.
Rabuka said this was not a decision he had taken lightly, but one that was “necessary in the best interest of the people that we serve”.
Fiji’s new Minister for Women, Children and Social Protection Sashi Kiran. Image: Fiji govt/RNZ Pacific
Sashi Kiran will replace Lynda Tabuya as the Minister for Women, Children and Social Protection, effective from the date of her swearing in by the President, Rabuka said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
He also said in a letter that all other people from his party’s list who could have replaced him, had also resigned as a block.
The letter was sent to government President Louis Mapou and copied to the French Pacific territory’s Congress President Veylma Falaeo.
The government of New Caledonia is made up of the parties represented at the Congress, under a proportional principle of “collegiality” — implying that all of its members and the parties they represent are supposed to work together.
In his letter, Katidjo-Monnier elaborated on growing tensions between Mapou’s government and the Congress MPs.
The tensions came to a head over the past few months, following the deadly pro-independence riots that started on May 13.
One particular point of contention was Mapou’s efforts to secure a loan of up to €1 billion (NZ$1.9 billion) from France, under a “PS2R” (reconstruction, refoundation and salvage) plan to rebuild New Caledonia after the riots damage estimated at some €2.2 billion (NZ$4 billion) and the subsequent thousands of job losses.
New Caledonia President Louis Mapou (centre) holding a press conference with some of his ministers in late November 2024. Image: New Caledonia govt/RNZ Pacific
Congress vs government: two opposing recovery plans At the same time, the Congress has been advocating for a different approach: a five-year reconstruction plan to secure funds from France.
A bipartisan delegation was last month sent to Paris to advocate for the plan — not in the form of reimbursable loans, but non-refundable grants.
The bipartisan delegation’s “grant” approach was said to be supported not only by Congress, but also by provincial assemblies and New Caledonia’s elected MPs in both houses of the French Parliament
The delegation was concerned that the loan would bring New Caledonia’s debt to unprecedented and unsustainable levels; and that at the same time, funds for the “PS2R” would be tied to a number of pre-conditioned reforms deemed necessary by France.
Katidjo-Monnier said neither the “obligation” for Congress and the government to act in “solidarity”, nor the “spirit of the Nouméa Accord”, had been respected.
Approached by local media on Tuesday, Mapou declined to comment.
‘Lack of solidarity’ The block resignation from Calédonie Ensemble entails that the whole government of New Caledonia is deemed to have resigned and should now act in a caretaker mode until a new government is installed.
The election of a new government must take place within 15 days.
One of the initial stages of the process is for the Congress to convene a special sitting to choose how many members should make up this new government (between five and 11) and then to proceed with their election.
The cabinet then elects a president.
Several governments have fallen under similar mass resignation circumstances and this “mass block resignation” ploy.
It has now been used 11 times since 1999, each time causing the downfall of the government.
Louis Mapou’s government was the 17th since New Caledonia’s autonomous government system was introduced in 1999.
He came to office in July 2021, months after the list of government members was chosen on 17 February 2021.
This was the first time a local territorial government’s leader belonged to the pro-independence camp.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
He also said in a letter that all other people from his party’s list who could have replaced him, had also resigned as a block.
The letter was sent to government President Louis Mapou and copied to the French Pacific territory’s Congress President Veylma Falaeo.
The government of New Caledonia is made up of the parties represented at the Congress, under a proportional principle of “collegiality” — implying that all of its members and the parties they represent are supposed to work together.
In his letter, Katidjo-Monnier elaborated on growing tensions between Mapou’s government and the Congress MPs.
The tensions came to a head over the past few months, following the deadly pro-independence riots that started on May 13.
One particular point of contention was Mapou’s efforts to secure a loan of up to €1 billion (NZ$1.9 billion) from France, under a “PS2R” (reconstruction, refoundation and salvage) plan to rebuild New Caledonia after the riots damage estimated at some €2.2 billion (NZ$4 billion) and the subsequent thousands of job losses.
New Caledonia President Louis Mapou (centre) holding a press conference with some of his ministers in late November 2024. Image: New Caledonia govt/RNZ Pacific
Congress vs government: two opposing recovery plans At the same time, the Congress has been advocating for a different approach: a five-year reconstruction plan to secure funds from France.
A bipartisan delegation was last month sent to Paris to advocate for the plan — not in the form of reimbursable loans, but non-refundable grants.
The bipartisan delegation’s “grant” approach was said to be supported not only by Congress, but also by provincial assemblies and New Caledonia’s elected MPs in both houses of the French Parliament
The delegation was concerned that the loan would bring New Caledonia’s debt to unprecedented and unsustainable levels; and that at the same time, funds for the “PS2R” would be tied to a number of pre-conditioned reforms deemed necessary by France.
Katidjo-Monnier said neither the “obligation” for Congress and the government to act in “solidarity”, nor the “spirit of the Nouméa Accord”, had been respected.
Approached by local media on Tuesday, Mapou declined to comment.
‘Lack of solidarity’ The block resignation from Calédonie Ensemble entails that the whole government of New Caledonia is deemed to have resigned and should now act in a caretaker mode until a new government is installed.
The election of a new government must take place within 15 days.
One of the initial stages of the process is for the Congress to convene a special sitting to choose how many members should make up this new government (between five and 11) and then to proceed with their election.
The cabinet then elects a president.
Several governments have fallen under similar mass resignation circumstances and this “mass block resignation” ploy.
It has now been used 11 times since 1999, each time causing the downfall of the government.
Louis Mapou’s government was the 17th since New Caledonia’s autonomous government system was introduced in 1999.
He came to office in July 2021, months after the list of government members was chosen on 17 February 2021.
This was the first time a local territorial government’s leader belonged to the pro-independence camp.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
