MIL OSI – Source: United Nations – New UN-backed report reflects ‘crushing’ impact of conflict in Syria on its people 10 March 2015 Four years of armed conflict, economic disintegration and social fragmentation in Syria have hollowed out its population by 15 percent, forced some 10 million people to flee their homes and reduced life expectancy by two decades – from nearly 76 years of age to 56 – according to a United Nations-backed report released today on the “catastrophic” impact of the conflict. “While crushing the aspirations of the Syrian people and their ability to build and form institutions that can restore human security and respect human dignity and rights, the armed conflict has depleted the capital and wealth of the country,” according to the Syria: Alienation and Violence, Impact of the Syria Crisis Report, produced by the Syrian Centre for Policy Research with the support of the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). “Measured in terms of human development capacity and choices, the [Human Development Index] HDI value of Syria degraded by 32.6 per cent since 2010, falling from just below a middle ranking position to 173rd position of 187 countries,” it said. Syria has become a country of poor people, with an estimated 4 in every 5 Syrians now living in poverty – 30 percent of the population having descended into abject poverty, according to the report. The report details the tragic context facing all people in Syria, including the lives of Palestine refugees that have not been spared the trauma, UNRWA says, noting that the agency delivers humanitarian aid to 460,000 refugees who are wholly dependent on it to help them meet minimum daily needs. During the last four years, more than 10 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes and neighbourhoods because of violence, fear, intimidation and homelessness. “The population of Syria was hollowed out by 15 percent as 3.33 million Syrians fled as refugees to other countries, together with a 1.55 million persons who migrated to find work and a safer life elsewhere,” the report explained. “Within the remaining population of Syria, some 6.80 million people had been internally displaced.” The report drew attention to “the appalling loss of life,” as the death toll increased in the past year reached 210,000 persons. And together with the 840,000 people who were wounded, 6 per cent of the population were killed, maimed or wounded during the conflict, it said. “Equally horrendous is the silent disaster that has reduced life expectancy at birth from 75.9 years in 2010 to an estimated 55.7 years at the end of 2014, reducing longevity and life expectancy by 27 per cent,” the report noted. In the midst of this social disintegration and economic degradation, the education, health and social welfare systems are in a state of collapse. The report said that education is in a state of collapse with half of all school-age children no longer attending school, with almost half of all children already losing three years of schooling. “Total economic loss since the start of the conflict until the end of 2014 is estimated at $202.6 billion, with damage to capital stock accounting for 35.5 per cent of this loss,” it said. “Total economic loss is equivalent to 383 per cent of the GDP of 2010 in constant prices.” The report concluded that “the people of Syria are now forced to live under a terrible state of exception, estrangement and alienation with a massive social, political and economic chasm dividing them from those involved in violence and the institutions of violence.” And humanitarian interventions are unable to keep pace with the rapidly escalating needs of the poor and displaced, who are increasing exposed to insecurity and sectarian violence. The report said its aim is to estimate, document and analyze the catastrophic socioeconomic impact of the ongoing armed conflict, and highlight some of the pitfalls and gaps in applying mainstream analytical framework due to the complexity and specificity of Syrian crisis. –]]>
UK’s record on implementing human rights judgments risks being undermined
MIL OSI – UK’s record on implementing human rights judgments risks being undermined
Prisoner voting
The Committee is, however, concerned by the Government’s failure to implement the judgments relating to prisoner voting and recommends the new Government brings forward legislation to implement the recommendations of the Joint Committee on the Draft Prisoner Voting Bill to demonstrate the UK’s continuing commitment to the rule of law. Judgments of the European Court are not merely advisory. The UK is under a binding legal obligation to implement them, an obligation it voluntarily assumed when it signed up to the European Convention on Human Rights, and its continuing failure to amend the law on prisoner voting undermines the UK’s credibility when invoking the rule of law to pressurise other states to comply with their legal obligations.Northern Ireland issues
The Committee is also concerned by the delays in the implementation of some judgments in Northern Ireland and recommends that the UK Government and the Northern Ireland Executive need to consider what lessons are to be learned from the seven years it has taken for the Marper judgment to be implemented in Northern Ireland, to prevent delays of this unacceptable length occurring again. The Committee welcomes the provisions in the Stormont House Agreement establishing the Historical Investigations Unit as a potentially significant breakthrough in the implementation of a number of outstanding judgments concerning inadequate investigations into deaths in Northern Ireland. However, it is concerned that the Legacy Investigation Branch of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), which is to carry out the work of the Historical Enquiries Team until the Historical Investigations Unit is established, cannot itself satisfy the requirements of Article 2 ECHR because of its lack of independence from the police service. It is also concerned by the five year limit on the work of the new Unit. The Committee recommends that legislation establishing the Historical Investigations Unit be treated as an urgent priority by the new Government.Other issues
The Committee also:- is concerned that the Government’s failure to implement the Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) judgment may be prolonging the chilling effect on freedom of expression and recommends that the new Government treat this Leveson recommendation as a priority.
- recommends that the Government bring forward the amendments to the two documents which are necessary in order to make clear to a person who is the subject of a whole life order that they can apply to the Secretary of State for discretionary release.
- reports that the Government’s systems for responding promptly and fully to Court judgments concerning human rights are generally working well.
- commends the Government for its annual report on human rights judgments and recommends some ways to make the report still more useful to Parliament, including by turning it into an “Annual Human Rights Report” to Parliament which would then form the basis of the annual appearance of the Human Rights Minister before this Committee.
- recommends that the Government become a champion of increasing parliamentary involvement in the ECHR system, beginning with the forthcoming Brussels Declaration on “Our Shared Responsibility” for the Convention rights which will be adopted at the end of March.
Obama’s Hard Turn to the Right in Hemispheric Policy
MIL OSI Analysis – Source: Council on Hemispheric Affairs – Analysis-Reportage – Obama’s Hard Turn to the Right in Hemispheric Policy
By: Frederick B. Mills, COHA Senior Research Fellow and Professor of Philosophy at Bowie State University
This article was originally published with Counterpunch at http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/10/obamas-hard-turn-to-the-right-in-hemispheric-policy/.
[caption id="attachment_1164" align="alignleft" width="300"]
US President Barack Obama. Image: Whitehouse.gov.[/caption]U.S. hemispheric policy reached a new low today when President Barack Obama invoked emergency powers to declare “a national emergency with respect to the unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States posed by the situation in Venezuela.” Thanks to Obama’s action, the U.S. has now blatantly rehabilitated its traditional imperial posture towards the South and challenged the continent-wide Bolivarian cause of Latin American and Caribbean independence and sovereignty. With such a reckless declaration, Washington has sent a green light to the ultra right opposition that was behind the anti-government violence in Venezuela during the first quarter of last year. This contravenes the current efforts of a delegation sent to Caracas by the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) to maintain the peace, and thereby further alienates a region committed to defending their national sovereignty and independence from any power block on earth.
While Venezuela has identified the issue of corruption, is prosecuting a number of its security personnel for human rights abuses, acknowledges the need and is engaged in the reform of police training and practice, and is indeed in the midst of an economic crisis, Washington’s exceptionalism as applied to Venezuela, may raise more than some skepticism. For the U.S. continues to lumber aid to the regime in Honduras and Mexico, which have engaged in well documented systematic brutality and gross violations of human rights. While all human rights abuses merit attention and accountability wherever they occur, the Obama Administration’s selective indignation aimed at Caracas,and a complete lack of critique of the violent anti-government guarimbas (violent demonstrations) of the first quarter of last year, is bound to draw questions about the motives of U.S. hostilities towards Venezuela.
Does the Bolivarian cause in Venezuela threaten U.S. national security? Venezuela is not at war with any country on earth, has declared the region a zone of peace, and has been helping mediate the talks between Bogotá and the FARC in order to bring the longest running civil war in the hemisphere to a negotiated solution. The base of support for the Chavista government of President Nicolas Maduro are not terrorists bent on destroying Western civilization; they include the millions of formerly excluded and poor who now have proper nutrition, housing, access to health care, to a free education, and a voice in the governance of their country. Times are hard for them too, but they prefer the ballot box as the means of settling political differences, not violence. The grassroots movements behind the cooperatives and community councils as well as the numerous social movements that put people before profits are not our enemies. They do not ask for intervention from the North. They expect to be left alone to pursue their own organized expressions of constituent power. From a Bolivarian, rather than a Monroe perspective, it is up to Venezuelans to address their economic problems, to root out corruption and to continue implementing the police reforms in their country, just as it is up to the people of the United States to address human rights abuses from Ferguson to New York City.
Polls conducted in Venezuela show that the large majority of respondents oppose attempts at extra-constitutional regime change and prefer democratic procedures for resolving political differences. They also show that most Venezuelans oppose a U.S. invasion of their country. It is critically important to note that campaigns for legislative seats in Venezuela’s National Assembly are getting started and these elections, which include opposition candidates, do not pose a threat to U.S. citizens either. The Venezuelan Electoral Commission (CNE) has a solid record and is second to none. Both Chavistas and allied parties as well as opposition MUD and their allies are using the CNE to run their primaries. Allowing the Venezuelan legislative elections later this year to be held in peace, so that Venezuelans themselves, not an outside power, can decide who governs them, is a pro-democracy perspective. And the opposition can use the recall referendum in 2016 if they seek to try to recall Maduro by constitutional means.
Does the Bolivarian cause in Venezuela threaten U.S. foreign policy? Venezuela has been at the forefront of regional integration ever since Hugo Chavez was first elected president in 1998. Chavez argued that a necessary condition for any nation in the region to depart from the Washington Consensus and forge an alternative economic policy is the independence and sovereignty of the region from imperial domination. He also promoted the idea that in a multi-polar world, the region would be more likely to diversify its trade relationships, experiment with complementary types of commerce, and avoid political submission to any power block on the planet. These ideas have actually been put into practice, bringing about an epochal change over the past sixteen years, that has led to the formation of ALBA, UNASUR, MERCOSUR, CELAC and other associations of Latin American and Caribbean nations that do not include the U.S. or Canada.
The recent CELAC—China conference in January is an example of this exercise of independence and multi-polarity. But none of this poses a threat to the American people or the state. It does however, challenge one of Obama’s major policy goals, the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. This free trade accord would be much easier to sell at the Summit of the Americas next month in Panama should the Maduro Administration be ousted in time. But that would be a crude calculation.
The people of the United States can benefit from a partnership with the new Latin America and Caribbean that complements each peoples’ needs and resources; but it must be based on mutual respect for sovereignty, and that means a U.S. policy that does not resort to “arm twisting” to impose free trade and neoliberal economic policies on our neighbors to the South. This would take a re-evaluation of the present overall U.S. hemispheric policy and an immediate step back from the precipice.
By: Frederick B. Mills, COHA Senior Research Fellow and Professor of Philosophy at Bowie State University
This article was originally published with Counterpunch at http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/10/obamas-hard-turn-to-the-right-in-hemispheric-policy/.
Featured Image: “Official Photo of the VI Summit of the Americas Cartegena 2012,” Javier Casella – SIG,
http://wsp.presidencia.gov.co/Especiales/Documents/CumbreAmericas/index.html
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Doctors Without Borders Sends US President Obama A Letter About The TPPA
MIL OSI –
Source: Doctors Without Borders – Press Releases/Statement:
Headline: Trans Pacific Partnership: A Letter to the President of the United States of America
Dear Mr. President:
MSF is an independent international medical humanitarian organization that delivers medical care to people affected by armed conflict, epidemics, natural disasters and exclusion from healthcare in nearly 70 countries. Our ambition to provide quality health care to these populations requires constant access to affordable, quality medicines and vaccines, and patient-focused innovation.
Despite our numerous attempts to engage constructively with various U.S. government constituencies on this issue, our concerns remain largely unaddressed. The ongoing TPP negotiations have been conducted in secret, without opportunity for public scrutiny. However, leaked texts indicate that intellectual property (IP) provisions proposed by the United States go well beyond rules established by the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). These demands will roll back public health safeguards and flexibilities enshrined in international and national laws, and put in place far-reaching monopoly protections that will restrict generic competition and keep medicine prices unaffordable in the long run.
Generic competition has proven to be the best way to reduce drug prices and improve access to treatment. Ministries of Health, humanitarian medical treatment providers like MSF, and donor-supported global health institutions routinely rely on affordable quality generic medicines to treat a variety of health needs. Two important U.S.-funded programs, the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, are salient examples of this, saving hundreds of millions of dollars a year and reaching more patients by purchasing generic medicines.
Both provisions contradict the Administration’s own priorities in the United States. The White House has proposed restricting some abusive evergreening practices in each budget proposal sent to the United States Congress since the beginning of your Presidency. The White House has also proposed reducing the period of exclusivity for biologics, citing the need to facilitate faster development of generic biologics and cost savings of up to billions of dollars over the next decade.
Other provisions proposed in the TPP, including patent term extensions, patent linkage, additional intellectual property enforcement measures and investor-state dispute settlements, are equally concerning from a public health and access to medicines perspective.
If these provisions are included in the final text of the agreement, they will represent a direct threat to the future availability of affordable medicines and vaccines for millions of patients in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as for MSF and governments in the region. In Mexico, a TPP-negotiating country, we are currently providing medical support to migrants and mental health services to victims of violence. But the TPP could have effects far beyond the current twelve negotiating countries. Because the TPP is billed as a 21st century model trade agreement that aims at becoming a global standard, it could have damaging repercussions for access to treatment and innovation worldwide.
We urge the United States to remove provisions that will harm access to medicines and to ensure that the final text is aligned with relevant global public health commitments. Such commitments include the 2001 WTO Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health; the WHO Global Strategy and Plan of Action on Public Health, Innovation and Intellectual Property; and the bipartisan United States May 10 Agreement, also known as the New Trade Policy.
The current biomedical innovation system is highly dysfunctional and unable to deliver affordable and needs-based medical tools for many of our medical operations. We are witnessing this in practice with the lack of appropriate medical tools to respond to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. We also see the innovation challenges here in the U.S. For example, the United States government is working to respond to the growing threat of antibiotic resistance and the insufficient pipeline of new antibiotics. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) has advised that major changes are needed to address these challenges and has suggested reforming the innovation system. By contrast, promoting longer monopolies through the TPP only reinforces and facilitates abuse of the current research and development system.
The United States government, under your leadership, should introduce global norms which reaffirm a public health imperative and promote balanced implementation of current intellectual property obligations. MSF believes this is essential to closing the gap in access to medicines for millions of people around the world. The TPP could be an opportunity to make significant progress toward these goals. Instead, in its current state, the TPP is a threat to the health of millions.
Thank you for your attention. We are available to discuss these issues further at your convenience.
Sincerely,
Sophie Delaunay
Executive Director, MSF USA
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders
Dr. Manica Balasegaram
Executive Director, MSF Access Campaign
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders
Please direct future correspondence and response on this issue to:
Sophie Delaunay,
Executive Director,
Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders-USA,
333 7th Avenue,
New York, NY 10001,
Phone: 1-212-655-3783
C.C.:
Sylvia Mathews Burwell, Secretary of Health and Human Services
Deborah Birx, Ambassador-at-Large and Coordinator of United States Government Activities to Combat HIV/AIDS Globally
Michael Froman, United States Trade Representative
Ron Wyden, Chairman, United States Senate Committee on Finance
Orrin Hatch, Ranking Member, United States Senate Committee on Finance
Dave Camp, Chairman, United States House of Representatives Committee on Ways and Means
Sander Levin, Ranking Member, United States House of Representatives Committee on Ways and Means
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Bribe-O-Meter Relaunched for Northland By-Election
Headline: MR: BRIBE-O-METER RELAUNCHED FOR NORTHLAND BY-ELECTION
10 MARCH 2015
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The Taxpayers’ Union is today proudly relaunching its election Bribe-O-Meter to keep track of politicians’ pork-barrel promises in the lead up to Northland’s by-election. Taxpayers’ Union Executive Director, Jordan Williams, says:
“While the by-election is for the seat of Northland, the cost of pork-barrel promises will impact the pockets of all New Zealand taxpayers.”
“The Prime Minister has already indicated that there will be further Northland-related policies launched throughout the campaign. The Bribe-O-Meter is to provide transparency to taxpayers on what those promises will cost.”
“Currently the National Party’s Northland promises equal $28.37 per New Zealand household. Winston Peters meanwhile is promising new ports and railways. Our initial estimate is that the cost, if implemented, would be at least $180 per household.”
The Bribe-O-Meter is available at www.taxpayers.org.nz/bribe-o-meter and will be updated regularly in the lead up to polling day on 28 March.
ENDS
ENQUIRIES:
Jordan Williams
021 762 542
NOTES TO EDITORS:
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is an independent activist group, dedicated to being the voice for Kiwi taxpayers in the corridors of power. It’s here to fight government waste and make sure New Zealanders get value for money from their tax dollar.
The Taxpayers’ Union operates a 24 hour media line for comment on taxpayer issues. Representatives are available on (04) 282 0302.
High resolution images and logos are available on request or online at http://www.taxpayers.org.nz/resources
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Full Transcript: The Nicky Hager Interview
Launch Programme – EveningReport.nz launched Monday March 9, 2015 with an extended one-on-one interview with investigative journalist Nicky Hager on the Snowden Revelations.
Manning: Nicky Hager, thank you for taking part in the launch of EveningReport.nz and also congratulations at the front-end for this investigation that is obviously ongoing at the moment. Now, Nicky, the state services review recently stated here ‘suspicions and mistrust have more opportunities to flourish in the absence of information’. Now that this kind of information is in the public arena is the public’s mistrust and suspicion warranted do you believe?
[caption id="attachment_981" align="alignleft" width="150"]
Investigative journalist, Nicky Hager. Image: PMC.[/caption]Hager: Oh I think so. What happens with spy agencies is that there’s a great arrogance around them. They use their secrecy which they need for their work to be a secrecy which means they don’t have to be accountable. That when people come up with allegations or want to know what they’re doing, they can say they’re far too secret and nobody needs to know, which is actually not true. That while some of what they do has to be secret mostly it’s just very convenient for these retiring kind of, you know, living in the shadows organisations to just have a ‘get out of jail free’ card on everything. So they can always deny and they can always say that it’s security stops them having to comment. And that’s not good enough in a democracy.
Manning: How do you think this affects the New Zealand democracy when the State is operating almost as an entity that has no consequence from oversight.. is almost an entity to its own?
Hager: To me it has two consequences. One is don’t have a serious debate about our foreign policy as its affected by intelligence, which to me is very important, but that’s only half the picture, because the other thing that happens is that if they won’t engage factually, it means that there’s a whole lot of wild fears and beliefs around what they do, which actually .. within New Zealand is more damaging than the truth. And what I’m talking about here is that I’m continually approached by people who believe or are worried that there’s a van outside their house with GCSB written on the inside that is bugging their lives, is intruding on them. Now this is a huge cost on a society. If your spy agencies play their secret games and won’t deny, won’t confirm anything, get caught out doing illegal spying, and still keep the barriers up, well then they have to expect this to happen, and they’re not doing their share of fixing it, which is people have real but actually unnecessary fears about them. So I’ve got a divided view about the intelligence agencies. On the one hand I think we fear them more than we need to, and there’s a widespread fear that there doesn’t have to be. On the other hand on the other things where they’re really doing thing wrong, and in their shadowy world they get away with a lot of things which are wrong and out of synch with our country, on those real things they don’t get accountability either.
[caption id="attachment_183" align="alignleft" width="150"]
Selwyn Manning, editor.[/caption]Manning: So if we’re looking at those specifics there, for example this is obviously like a dragnet type operation that you and David Fisher and others have brought to the public, the ‘full take collection’ being the key words here obviously, so that means everybody in the Pacific, that goes down to some small, even a teenager using a cell phone is being captured and is that data, is that communication being stored somewhere, so that even when that person perhaps is ten years older it could be retrieved, and even potentially used against them?
Hager: OK, it’s important that I explain what we know and what we’re not sure of here. So what we know is an absolute fact now, without a doubt, is that the GCSB and its Waihopai station like its overseas allies have moved to this full take collection. And what that means is yes, right down to the person who uses gmail on a little island of Tuvalu or the person who’s calling their aunty in New Zealand from Samoa or whatever it is, this stuff is being captured and it’s on a huge scale. That’s all true. It doesn’t mean that all those people are being actively watched, because most of them can’t be, which is where we don’t want to spread unnecessary fear. But their communications are being caught. What we don’t know because there is just no source on this is how long they keep it all… It used to be at Waihopai that they would search for what was going on and it would just disappear into the ether the next second. What seems to be going on now, what my best guess would be is that they have got all these national security agency programmes which are processing, like a great big food production company with everyone’s messages and emails and everything from around the Pacific, they’re processing that into different formats. One is putting them into databases of phone calls and literal emails and text messages which are available for some length of time for analysts to look through. We don’t know the length of time and that’s the bit I’m personally uncertain. It won’t be forever because the bulk of this stuff will just be beyond us I think, at least on current storage capability. But the other thing that they are doing is saving what’s called the metadata. Metadata is this word that came into the general language pretty much with Edward Snowden and that means that the thing often most valuable to an intelligence agency is not being able to listen to every phone call, which would take them a thousand life times, you can’t do that, it’s that they store up the ‘who called who’, ‘what time they did it’, ‘what was the nearest cell phone tower’ and when you build up year after year of everyones’ calls and everyone’s connections that’s extremely valuable if you’re trying to connect up people or track down people, or find out who peoples’ friends are, in their crazy world of thinking they need to spy on everybody. Now that metadata, my strong presumption is that if it’s not already, it will pretty soon be saved permanently. That that’s a low enough data sizes that we can expect that side of it will be permanently recorded for the young boy or girl going on to gmail, or the person contacting their aunty in New Zealand, or whatever.
Manning: I also understand that there’s been significant ongoing development in the infrastructure in the United States, particularly on the western side, to contain and become storage silos for such information.
Hager: That’s right. So what we know is whether you’re talking about the Waihopai base in New Zealand, the documents we had talked about how they were building up their capacity ready for full take collection so they actually had enough computer storage for all the new huge increase in data they would be bringing in there, and then you got the other extreme which is in the desert in the United States where they’re building these massive warehouses which are just going to try to store the world’s communications. Everything forever, we don’t know that because these are very secret activities but what we do know for certain is these agencies with their obsessive desire to have everything everywhere and for as long as they can are holding as much of this data for as long as they can everywhere.
Manning: And of course what we’re talking about here is the full take collection of communications within the realm of New Zealand, that’s an awful name isn’t it, including Tokelau, Niue, Cook Islands.. significantly too Fiji, Samoa, Tonga. I would imagine that the sensitivity inside Tonga in particular would be heightened when you consider that ‘Akilisi Pohiva is the new Prime Minister over in Tonga who has had a lifetime of activism, a lifetime of political representation from the grassroots coming through. The pro-democracy movement has been in the past hammered in Tonga by the nobility and the clash within that community. Now this kind of revelation where the big powers of the Pacific, and certainly the US leading the charge, what kind of effect do you think that’s going to have on the way Tonga interacts with New Zealand?
Hager: This is a very interesting question. Can I correct something first, because we want to be as accurate as we can be when we’re given fog and mist and then when we’re trying to engage with the agencies. So just to be clear from what we managed to find out Tokelau is not on the target list and Cook Islands and Niue are all New Zealand citizens so the citizens aren’t being spied on but the government is. So those are the only exceptions and every other country like Tonga is being comprehensively spied on all the time.. So what do I think about Tonga for example. If I was a leader in Tonga I would be incensed because Tonga doesn’t spy on New Zealand. Tonga doesn’t spy on the US. New Zealand has no special reason. There have been a few people in New Zealand commenting ‘of course we would spy on the South Pacific, we need to know what’s going on’ which is an incredibly patronising, colonial kind of view of the world. That somehow you can’t have diplomats sit around over a drink or coffee with people in these countries and talk to them and treat them as human beings you can actually understand, as opposed to having to read their private emails in the Prime Minister’s department or something. This is an unnecessary way to do things and so if was the leader of Tonga I would be really mad at New Zealand. I would be mad first of all because we do it, but secondly because why we do it. Because I do not believe that the New Zealand intelligence agencies are collecting information on Tonga because there is a burning foreign policy desire to have strong information and do the right things on Tonga. The reason that we spy on Tonga is the same reason we spy on Tuvalu, and the same reason we spy on Vanuatu, and that is, simply, that we have got we have got what’s called an area of responsibility in the Five Eyes alliance. They are just tokens of our allegiance to a US intelligence alliance. In other words the reason we spy on those countries literally – I’m really sure I’m right on this – the primary reason we do it is so that we can have an offering, a useful offering, at the table when we’re one of the Five Eyes intelligence partners. So this is even more insulting than if we were spying on the Tongans and others because we wanted to know their secrets. That’s not even the reason we’re doing it. We’re just doing it to buy our way into closer relations with the US intelligence alliance. It’s a really scummy reason when you think about these are our neighbours we’re selling out for that.
Manning: And if we look too at French Polynesia, New Caledonia comes into the scope of the New Zealand GCSB surveillance here, and that takes a more sinister overtone when you consider that nation and France that controls that territory is a nuclear power. Do you think that that has a consequence on the way New Zealand can be treated perhaps by France when it realises that OK now New Zealand it’s official really, in the sense that the official documents are suggesting, is the primary collector of all communications on its territory in the Pacific?
Hager: I think it’s a little bit different for France. For these smaller countries, I won’t call them naive but they are not in the swim of big time espionage and high-level politics. These are small countries… some of them are the size of a small town in New Zealand, literally, and so they can’t be expected to have the infrastructure to present themselves, the high level codes to be involved in world espionage or something. When you get to France, France does this stuff themselves. They know it goes on so they’re going to have a completely different attitude actually and it won’t come even as the slightest surprise to them to know New Zealand has been spying on their territories for years, so I think in terms of diplomatic and emotional impact it will be different there. It’s those small countries, it’s the ones where we don’t have a good excuse, and we’re just selling them out where I think it’s particularly bad.
Manning: Where the bully factor kicks in…
Hager: Where the arrogant, don’t care about them… we claim to care, we profess to be great buddies and actually just be prepared to sell them down the river because we can get some benefit in Washington.
Manning: I notice some of your critics on social media this week as the information has been revealed to the public have criticised in this way: so what, of course New Zealand does this, it’s a part of the Five Eyes. And of course on the other side they’re saying China will be doing it so what does it matter? How do you respond to that?
Hager: I think this is a kind of world-weary, cynical, kind of know-it-all view actually. Because the world doesn’t know that New Zealand spies on all those Pacific countries, especially not in the way that we do. And the idea that it’s natural for a little country of 4 million people, which claims to have these special relationships country by country around the Pacific and be their friend, to be intensely spying on them against their interests, this is not known. I’m afraid that’s what you get with a certain kind of journalist or commentator is that they will say something’s wrong, they’ll believe it’s wrong, they’ll just as happily have said I’ve got the whole story wrong and then when it’s proven right they’ll say ‘yep, everyone knew this, so what’. I don’t think those people are kind of our moral and political thinkers and leaders, and we shouldn’t take their views too seriously.
Manning: OK if we’re looking at New Zealand hoovering up all of this information on its so-called colonial patch here in the south-west Pacific, who’s doing it to New Zealand? If the GCSB is not doing it to New Zealand itself, which one of the Five Eyes partners is doing it to us?
Hager: Well we don’t know what we don’t know. I think it’s an open question whether the US national security agency quietly spies on its allies like New Zealand. Because one of the things that is absolutely clear from the Snowden revelations is that other US intelligence allies like France, Germany and the rest of Europe who thought they were the closest buddies and were immune form US spying were being spied on just the same as any other country. So maybe New Zealand is getting that, but we don’t know that. But I actually think this is a very important question in terms of New Zealanders’ feelings on these sorts of things – Is every New Zealander being spied on from somewhere? Well according to the documents I’ve seen, no they’re not. The debate in New Zealand is about how the GCSB has acted, as if the GCSB is there to spy on New Zealanders – it’s not, it’s a foreign intelligence organisation, that’s what it was set up to do. Spying on New Zealanders is not part of its routine remit. And there have been exceptions because they’ve been operating in the shadows, so they’ve stretched the rules and they’ve done other things like the illegal spying on 88 people over the last 10 years that came up. But 88 people over 10 years is not a very large number, it’s not their primary work. So one of the things I wanted to emphasise when we actually had the Snowden documents and we could tell the proper story, as far as those documents would allow us, was hey everyone let’s focus on the issue that is most important about this, which is not the privacy of someone living in Wellington or Auckland, it’s the privacy of someone living in Honiara or Suva, and many other countries that are yet to be revealed actually because we’ve got many more stories to come. Now I think that’s probably the first important lesson about this. On the other hand mass surveillance systems are a problem and if you are have a mass surveillance system for a start which is spying on the whole of the south Pacific, heaps of New Zealanders have their families there, were born there, they come and go from there, they might be living there at the moment, they go on holiday there, they’re doing business there and all of their communications are being caught as well. Which is why I hadn’t actually thought this through when I was writing the stories but I’m very pleased that there’s been a complaint that’s gone into the Inspector General of Intelligence and Security to say ‘wait a moment, is this actually lawful?’ for every New Zealander who one way or another is living in the Pacific, interacting with the Pacific, to have their communications intercepted, which is what a mass surveillance full take collection means. That’s great, that’s very important. And within New Zealand there’s another level of it in that the GCSB can be used, and the laws were actually strengthened on this, by the police, by the defence force, by the SIS, to target people in New Zealand. And because that’s happening in secret, and without proper accountability, and because they always get things wrong, we can reliably expect that there are going to be more scandals come out on this. That there will be more things that they have done wrong. And while I don’t think they’re doing mass surveillance, I’m certain the GCSB is not doing mass surveillance every day of every New Zealander, and getting metadata on every New Zealander, they are doing operations agains particular New Zealanders and some of them are going to blow up in their faces because they will have done stupid things again.
Manning: Now the presumption would be that New Zealand doesn’t have the capability to develop the technology that’s necessary to do this type of operation, so what do we know about that technology .. and where it’s based in New Zealand, and who provides it? My presumption clearly is that it’s US led, Five Eyes type of equipment.
Hager: The idea that New Zealand can’t do it ourselves is fairly accurate, but it’s irrelevant because the GCSB is not a New Zealand operation in any practical sense. Our latest story on the Waihopai facility, which is New Zealand’s main Five Eyes contribution, is that when you go inside it – which we could only do with the Snowden documents, not physically – every single piece of the equipment there, every program on the computers, every database, every search took, every intelligence processing tool is an NSA tool or British GCHQ – that’s their equivalent of the GCSB and NSA. Every single thing there is British or American technology which is the same in every other place like this around the world. So it’s nominally a New Zealand base but actually the only sense in which it’s even vaguely a New Zealand base is that there are New Zealanders who go in there and do the work of managing and tending foreign equipment. And apart from that, as the stories have been showing, it’s barely a New Zealand operation. When they do the spying on the whole of the south Pacific, and suck in all this material and then save it as metadata or in other ways, if a New Zealand intelligence officer wants to look at that, it’s not New Zealand data, what they do is they go into an NSA database to look for it. That’s how integrated it is. It’s not even that the Americans can look at the New Zealand intelligence. It becomes American intelligence within (that) system and if New Zealanders want to see it they have to go to it through a US interface and look at it on a US database. That’s how integrated we are.
Manning: Now the Prime Minister said this in his criticism of yourself and others involved in this investigation is that some of the information is old, the presumptions that have been made – or the word presumption is what he’s referring to – are inaccurate, that basically there’s nothing to see here. In your book Secret Power, the foreword written by David Lange – and I think it surprised many who would read that book to realise that the Prime Minister at the time that the GCSB was established here knew very little of what its intention was, and what it went about doing. Do you think that our representatives, those that are in the Beehive governing the affairs of New Zealand in an executive government are aware of this type of information, aware of what is going on, or are they looking the other way and saying I don’t want to know, or are they blindly lying?
Hager: My own view is, of course I don’t know for sure. This is what I believe from having worked on this hard, and working on the subject of course for many years since I was writing that first book. I feel fairly confident that John Key won’t know most of the stuff that we reveal, the details that we’ve just come out with about what’s going on inside the Waihopai station, he won’t know that. He won’t know that but more to the point he’s not interested, he doesn’t care, he doesn’t care about foreign policy very much, he’s never taken an interest in it. It’s not a part of his life, he likes to meet important people overseas but he’s not actually interested in foreign policy or defence policy or intelligence policy. So I see no reason why he would have taken any close look at any of this, and so he’s actually, when I was writing that book, he’s more or less in the tradition of a line of National Party leaders who have traditionally been in charge of the intelligence services, which is that they don’t look because they don’t really care, and the ships pretty much run themselves. So that’s the main thing I would say about John Key’s involvement, but in terms of his immediate reaction which was before the material had even began to be published he said it was wrong, he knew it would be wrong, it was wrong like my last book and that kind of statement. He’s just making that up. What he’s doing is – to move into political analysis – he’s trying to talk to people who have got a tribal view of politics and say to them don’t look at this. In fact he even made the astonishing statement, which is quite spooky in a supposedly democratic country, where he said I strongly advise New Zealanders not to even read these stories when they come out. Now what kind of a weirdo is that? What kind of strange idea is it that you want the public not to even hear a different point of view? So I don’t think this is about his knowledge, or even about secrecy of intelligence, I think it’s a peculiar style of political management where he’s inviting as much, as large a section of the public as possible to not engage, and not to think, and not to listen to a point of view which he’s saying that they shouldn’t listen to. Of course for me it’s been very satisfying because he said in advance, that it was going to be wrong, when it came out he said it’s going to be wrong and then since then the former head of the GCSB, who knows much more about this than he has, has been on the radio seeing that in fact the whole story is right.
Manning: Clearly there is a lot of information going to be revealed over time. One of the things that seems to remain unanswered at this juncture is the idea that was put out there, or the statement that was put out there, by Edward Snowden last year in the election campaign that there was an NSA base in Auckland. And he made reference to another one as well. Now what information do you have that would indicate that this was accurate or not?
Hager: I’ve actually been in contact with Edward Snowden about that, I can explain now. And this is a work in progress. We’re in communication about it and what he was writing about and spoke about there has some substance to it, but he had his geography slightly wrong. That’s actually the true story of this because I’ve been in contact with him which is what he said to me, but we haven’t got to the bottom of what he actually does know yet, so I won’t speak up on that, because I’m not sure what the final answer is going to be.
Manning: Thanks Nicky. Thanks very much for taking part.
Response Report: Hager says NZ spying bad for Pacific relations (PMC Audio)
Reporter: Alistar Kata. AUCKLAND: It’s no secret that NZ is spying on its Pacific neighbours. Investigative journalist Nicky Hager says intercepted communications from countries such as Fiji, Samoa and Tonga and Vanuatu are captured as “full-take collection” by the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) and passed onto the US National Security Agency. In an extended interview with journalist Selwyn Manning on the newly launched EveningReport.nz website, Hager says New Zealand’s position is “arrogant”. (ref. ER episode 1) He says the New Zealand move will prove bad for future relations with Pacific governments. “It’s those small countries, the ones were we don’t have a good excuse and we are just selling them out, where I think it’s going to be bad,” he says.
- Interviewees:
Investigative journalist Nicky Hager
Journalist and EveningReport editor Selwyn Manning
Pacific Studies Professor Steve Ratuva (Canterbury University)
Pacific Media Centre, School of Communication Studies, AUT University.
Response Report: Hager slams NZ ‘arrogance’ over spying in new e-media interview (PMC)
Report by Alistar Kata.
AUCKLAND (Pacific Media Watch/Pacific Media Centre): Investigative journalist and author Nicky Hager has condemned the New Zealand government as being “arrogant” over revelations about its spying on Pacific neighbours.
[caption id="attachment_941" align="alignright" width="300"]
Evening Report, Episode 1, Nicky Hager.[/caption]
Hager talked with journalist Selwyn Manning last night about the implications and challenges to the New Zealand public and Pacific communities.
The interview was hosted on a new independent interactive news website, eveningreport.nz
Manning, editor of eveningreport.nz, said the launch of the website could not have come any sooner.
“I intended for the launch to be in April,” he said.
“But with the investigation rolling out of the Snowden revelations and what that means to New Zealanders – but most importantly to those in the Pacific region – the site is perfect for that type of topic”.
With the recent wave of popularity with online media, particularly blog sites, Manning said audiences needed a place where “robust debate” took place.
Blogs partisan
“Most of the blogs are very partisan, they’re extremely biased and often are opinion driven in their items and articles,” he said.
“I think that the New Zealand public deserve to have a place where it can go irrespective of the political position a person may have, where they can have robust debate without being swamped by people attacking their views.”
As well as providing a reliable news service, eveningreport.nz will engage audiences in debates through respectful channels.
“The You Live section for example will provide a live text, live audio and live video platform for the audience itself to debate the issues in real time,” Manning said.
“There are safety mechanisms built into the technology, so if someone’s being an idiot on the live functions of the site whether it be audio or whatever, people can report that person.”
References:
Response Report: NZ ‘selling out’ Pacific neighbours to ‘buy’ US links, says Hager
NSA Worldwide SIGINT Platform 2013. Photo: NSA via Wikimeida Commons.[/caption]
Report – By Michael Neilson
Investigative journalist Nicky Hager has denounced critics who minimised the Snowden espionage revelations, saying New Zealand has no good reason to spy, and is “selling out” its Pacific neighbours to “buy [its] way into closer relations with the United States intelligence alliance”.
Hager was speaking in an interview on the new e-media site EveningReport.nz launched last night about the latest revelations from US whistleblower Edward Snowden.
Even though the extensive data is collected and stored at the Waihopai base it is fed straight into the US intelligence network, and New Zealand cannot even access it without going through the US system, said Hager.
New Zealand’s Pacific neighbours had built up trust over several decades and should feel violated, such as Tongan Prime Minister ‘Akilisi Pohiva who reacted strongly last week, said Hager.
New Zealanders who were in the Pacific could also have their data collected.
The investigative journalist supported the complaint being made to the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security by the Green Party over whether it was legal.
Hager criticised Prime Minister John Key’s advice for New Zealanders to avoid the revelations, saying intelligence and foreign policy were not Key’s main interests and he was trying to deflect attention from their activities.
Editor and founder of EveningReport.nz Selwyn Manning said the site provided independent analysis of public interest issues and served as a platform for live video debates, interviews, and viewer input.
Manning said the site would appeal to New Zealanders who wanted to debate the big issues without the “tribal” political nature of blogs.
The site’s focus was on public interest advocacy of humanitarianism, environmentalism, progressive economics, sustainable business practice, and security, said Manning.
Manning said the website was looking for well-researched and well-argued submissions from all fields – “be they journalists, writers, or anybody else” who could contribute to New Zealand debate on issues.
Michael Neilson is a Postgraduate Diploma in Communication Studies student journalist at AUT University.
]]>Delay in communicating threat questioned
MIL OSI – Source: Massey University
Headline: Delay in communicating threat questioned
One of the letters sent to Fonterra containing the blackmail threat
Dr Chris Galloway.[/caption]
“You can understand way the authorities didn’t release the information immediately, but after a short period to check out their veracity, I think most parents would have preferred to find out as soon as possible,” Dr Galloway says.“Most people operate on a belief they have the right to know and they want to be able to make a decision about whether to stop using a product or not, even when the risk is minimal.”
Dr Galloway says the message that the risk was low and the police were doing everything possible to monitor the threat and apprehend the blackmailer would have done more to establish trust with the public if communicated earlier.
“Announcing the threat four months after the fact puts them in a weaker position,” he says.
Dr Galloway says the agrifood sector is so critical to New Zealand’s economic success that more coordinated crisis communication plans are needed.
[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="196"]
Professor Steve Flint.[/caption]
“Key stakeholders need to have a co-ordinating action team to so they can move quickly in cases like this to minimise damage to consumer confidence.”
Meanwhile, Massey University food safety specialist Professor Steve Flint says unless the alleged blackmailer threatening to contaminate infant milk formula with 1080 works at a dairy company, it would be extremely difficult for them to access the product.
Professor Flint, from the Institute of Food Science and Technology, says that other means of contamination open to the blackmailer were also limited.
“Supermarkets also have tamper-proof packaging it’s unlikely they’d be able to access it that way either.”
Professor Flint says as with any threat “you can never be completely assured of safety.” However, the chance of this threat happening in New Zealand is extremely low.
Created: 10/03/2015 | Last updated: 10/03/2015
– -]]>ESR part of response to formula threat
MIL OSI –
Source: ESR – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: ESR part of response to formula threat
ESR is part of the Government and industry response dealing with a criminal blackmail threat concerning the contamination of infant and other milk-powder-based formula. We will assist the Ministry for Primary Industries and Police in a sampling/testing/toxicology workstream by examining any products referred to us from Police under an agreed triage criteria and response protocol.
Public information is available here (external link) and any request for media comment should be directed to the Ministry for Primary Industries as the lead agency.
← Back to news
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]]>Police warn buyers from social media sites to be wary following gunpoint robbery
Headline: Police warn buyers from social media sites to be wary following gunpoint robbery
Tuesday, 10 March 2015 – 6:53pm
Be wary of dealing with strangers and where possible, conduct transactions using traceable payment options is the message from Waikato Police investigating the gunpoint robbery of a man in Gordonton overnight.
Detective Russell Crawford of the Ngaruawahia CIB said detectives were alerted to the incident after a distraught man flagged down a passing patrol car on SH3 in Otorohanga about 4pm.
“It appears our victim has driven up from New Plymouth to Hamilton yesterday morning to purchase a motorbike he saw for sale on a Facebook based site that specialises in selling motorbikes.
“He had arranged to meet the seller at the Five Crossroads shops but when he arrived the “seller” advised him to go to a Gordonton property. When the victim arrived a Caucasian male opened a farm gate to let the victim’s car and trailer in and suddenly he found himself confronted by a second male brandishing a firearm.”
Mr Crawford said the victim was understandably traumatised by what happened with the offenders making him lie on the ground and threatening to shoot him several times.
“The pair have taken the victim’s money he intended purchasing the motorbike with and fled in a getaway vehicle driven by a third offender.
“The man was so shaken he didn’t call 111 and instead began to drive home, flagging down the first Police car he saw which was in Otorohanga. Obviously with the benefit of hindsight Police would recommend calling 111 immediately but the man was obviously in an emotional and stressed state.”
Mr Crawford said while Police work closely with a number of internet based selling companies the number of social media based operations was increasing all the time and he urged potential buyers to take some simple safety precautions.
• Where possible avoid paying cash, instead make a bank payment so there is an auditable trail of the transaction
• Avoid carrying large some of cash and if you must use this form of payment, ensure you go with someone else and conduct the transaction in a well lit, public place where you can be seen
• Obtain as much detail of the seller as you can prior to the purchase such as their name, their phone number, address or any other identifiable piece of information
• Remember, if the deal seems too good to be true it probably is and by buying that super deal you may make yourself the next victim
• Never use a money transfer service to send money overseas
• Keep all emails, texts and messages exchanged with the seller
End
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Coming Up Tonight On Evening Report – March 10 2015
Evening Report editor, Selwyn Manning.[/caption]From The Editor’s Desk.
Coming up tonight on Evening Report at 8pm:
Lead Report: We have a full transcript of the extended interview with Nicky Hager on the Snowden Revelations.
Response-Reports: We have two reports framing the Nicky Hager interview by rookie journalist Alistar Kata. She’s an absolute professional and a journalist to watch in the future (Audio report) + (News Report).
Full Coverage: And we have full raw coverage of this threat to contaminate infant and other formula in what the government states is an apparent protest over the use of 1080 in pest control.
ALSO:
- * Auckland Council states nothing can be done for significant Titirangi kauri trees.
* Retail card spending is up according to Statistics NZ.
* Regionally rare yellow-crowned kakariki on the increase
* NIWA’s research receives international recognition
* PhD thesis captures secret to cricket’s success
Fonterra Gives Assurances While Acknowledging Contamination Threat
MIL OSI –
Fonterra Acknowledges Criminal Threat
Fonterra Co-operative Group Limited acknowledges the announcement by the New Zealand Police and the New Zealand Government about an investigation into a criminal threat relating to the Government’s use of Sodium monofluoroacetate (1080) poison as pest control to protect the country’s native flora and fauna.
The Government said today that there was no health risk to consumers. It has assessed the likelihood of the threat being carried out as ‘extremely low’. For further information please go to: www.foodprotection.govt.nz
Fonterra Chief Executive Theo Spierings said the criminal threat targeted New Zealand and the entire dairy industry.
“We can fully assure our customers and consumers that all of our milk and products are safe and of high quality, and our supply chain continues to be secure and world-class. We are playing our part in helping the Government manage the criminal threat, as is the rest of the dairy industry.
“We have taken immediate and decisive steps to give our customers and consumers added confidence – including increased testing and security measures.”
· Fonterra has worked with the New Zealand Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) to establish a validated testing regime that is being used by the dairy industry for both raw milk and dairy products targeted by the threat, he said.
· In mid-January, Fonterra began its own testing regime to provide its customers with further assurances as to the safety of its products. Fonterra is testing all raw milk that it processes – testing every tanker.
· Fonterra is testing all paediatric products and nutritional base powders that it manufactures as well as all paediatric products and nutritional base powders manufactured after 1 September 2014.
· The testing methods that Fonterra uses are validated and have been approved by the MPI. The laboratories undertaking the testing are accredited to ISO 17025 and are MPI recognised dairy laboratories.
]]>Reserve Bank again has to clean up National’s housing mess – Labour
MIL OSI – Source: Labour Party – Press Release/Statement Headline: Reserve Bank again has to clean up National’s housing mess Yet again the Reserve Bank has been forced to clean up National’s housing mess with the Government clearly incapable of solving the home affordability crisis, says Grant Robertson. “The Reserve Bank’s plan to effectively restrict lending on investment properties has real merit if it helps level the playing field for first home buyers. “But the Reserve Bank should not be sent in to clean up the mess the Government has left behind. Graeme Wheeler is the Reserve Bank Governor, not the Housing Minister. Nick Smith is missing in action. “National needs to learn its lessons from the crippling effect LVRs have had on first home buyers and the regions. Bill English didn’t even ask about the impact of LVRs on first home buyers before he gave the Reserve Bank the green light to push ahead. “The first question on his lips should be: ‘will this make it easier for first home buyers?’ Only then should he give it the thumbs up,” says Grant Robertson. –]]>
MPI supporting Police with infant formula contamination threat response
MIL OSI – Source: Ministry for Primary Industries – Press Release/Statement: Headline: MPI supporting Police with infant formula contamination threat response
- strengthened security measures in retail stores
- enhanced milk and milk product testing, including a new 1080 testing programme
- increased vigilance by all relevant players in the supply chain
- extra physical security at manufacturing premises
- an audit programme to confirm dairy processing facilities continue to maintain the highest level of security and vigilance.
Regionally rare yellow-crowned kakariki on the increase
MIL OSI – Source: Greater Wellington Regional Council – Press Release/Statement Headline: Regionally rare yellow-crowned kakariki on the increase
Regionally rare yellow-crowned kakariki on the increase
A flurry of yellow-crowned kakariki (parakeet) sightings across the region is ‘extremely pleasing’, says Greater Wellington Regional Council Environmental Scientist Nikki McArthur. The population growth is being attributed to the results of extensive predator control along with unusually heavy flowering and fruiting of native trees over the past year. The yellow-crowned kakariki (Cyanoramphus auriceps) is native to New Zealand and is found in most large native forests on the mainland – but is listed as ‘regionally rare’ in the greater Wellington region. The reverse is true for the red-crowned kakariki, they are the more common of the two species in the Wellington region, but are largely restricted to pest-free off-shore islands in other parts of the country. “We were delighted to receive reports of yellow-crowned kakariki spotted by a local bird enthusiast in the Porirua Scenic Reserve recently. To my knowledge this is the first time this species has been recorded in the reserve,” says McArthur. “We know that their red-crowned relatives have been present for a number of years. “It is the latest in an impressive list of natural re-colonisations that have occurred in the Porirua Scenic Reserve over the last decade. The 200ha reserve is the largest native forest remnant in the Porirua Basin. It supports a wide range of insects, nectar and seed producing trees which provide food for many bird species. Bellbird and whiteheads are now also seen in good numbers.” Possum control began in the reserve in 1996, from 2001 rats and stoats were also targetted. GWRC is working in partnership with Porirua City Council, as part of GWRC’s Key Native Ecosystem programme, to protect the biodiversity values of the reserve and surrounding forest on private land. GWRC officers believe the yellow-crowned kakariki have made landfall in Porirua from predator-free Mana Island, a stronghold for the species. The sighting is the latest in a series of observations of this elusive bird in new and unexpected locations. Yellow crowned kakariki have also been spotted in the East Harbour Regional Park for the first time in 30 years and a pair reported in the foothills of the Tararua Ranges, near Masterton. “We think these kakariki species have had a bumper breeding season at key sites such as Kapiti, Mana and Matiu/Somes Islands and possibly some mainland sites such as Zealandia, Porirua Scenic Reserve and East Harbour Regional Park too. I think this might be resulting in an unusually large number of juvenile kakariki exploring new sites at the moment.” Kakariki are one of New Zealand’s more mobile birds capable of dispersing many kilometres. They can be seen in native forests and reserves but will also visit back gardens and will feed on both natives and exotic plant species, even grazing for seeds on unmown lawns. “It’s really exciting to see the results of our biosecurity and biodiversity work paying off with populations of these species looking stronger. These new colonisations are really interesting and we’d like to know more about how kakariki distribution is changing in the region.” GWRC is keen to hear of both yellow and red-crowned kakariki sightings. Details of the location, date and number of birds sighted should be forwarded to environmentalscience@gw.govt.nz. These observations will contribute to an increasingly detailed picture of kakariki distribution in the Wellington region and inform decisions about conservation activities in the future. ENDS Contact: Media phone: 021 914 266 or email comms@gw.govt.nz.Back to top
–]]>Government Taking A Threat To Contaminate Baby Food Seriously
Headline: Criminal threat being taken seriously
The Government is taking a criminal threat to contaminate food products very seriously, and is reassuring parents that our infant and other formulas are safe and that extra testing and security measures have been implemented as a further safeguard.
The New Zealand Police and the Ministry of Primary Industries announced today they have been working with a range of agencies to assess and respond to a threat to contaminate infant and other milk formula products in an apparent protest over the use of 1080 pest control.
“We would like to reassure New Zealanders that every step possible has and is being taken to respond to this threat and ensure the ongoing safety of our food products,” says Primary Industries Minister Nathan Guy, Trade Minister Tim Groser, and Food Safety Minister Jo Goodhew.
“While the police have advised the risk is low, we are taking this very seriously. Since the threat was received last November, the Police have been actively investigating, while the Ministry of Primary Industries and other government agencies have been working closely with industry players across the supply chain to insure that all New Zealanders can have the upmost confidence in these products,” says Mr Guy.
“Every resource has been made available and we have treated this as a top priority. Ministers have taken expert advice on how to respond to a threat of this type and made considered decisions.
“The Government’s first priority is the safety of our food for consumers, both here and overseas. We are highly confident our products are safe and new increased dairy product testing gives even greater assurance.
“It’s hugely disappointing that someone would try to damage New Zealand’s strong reputation for top quality products and processes.”
Mr Groser says New Zealand officials have informed authorities in our major markets about this criminal threat and our measures in response.
Mrs Goodhew says New Zealand has a world class food safety system which has been further reinforced by recent improvements.
“We now have a comprehensive new 1080 testing regime for dairy products that gives us a high degree of confidence. MPI has also analysed the supply chain in detail and worked with manufacturers to put in place additional security measures,” she says.
“This new testing is on top of our normal thorough testing, auditing and verification system. It is extremely unlikely that anybody could deliberately contaminate formula during manufacturing, and there is no evidence of this ever having occurred.
“In addition, we have worked with retailers to address any risk to food products at the retail end of the chain.
“The advice to consumers is not to consume any food product that appears to be have been tampered with, and report it to the Ministry for Primary Industries immediately.
“Any signs of tampering are easy to spot. Detailed information on how to check products and further information is available at www.foodprotection.govt.nz.”
If parents or caregivers have any concerns they can contact Plunketline 0800 933 922 or Healthline 0800 611 116.
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MP’s Pay Reform A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing – Taxpayer’s Union
MIL OSI –
Source: Taxpayers Union – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: MR: MPS’ PAY REFORM A WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING
10 MARCH 2015
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Politicians are trying to pull the wool over New Zealand taxpayers in relation to MP pay reform, says the New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union. Figures show that had the proposed policy changes been in place since National came into office, MPs’ pay rises would have averaged 3.1% rather than the 1.7% that occurred. Taxpayers’ Union Spokesman, Ben Craven, says:
“John Key said he wanted to put a cap on MP pay inflation. In fact, the new model would have resulted in pay increases nearly twice the size of what MPs received in the last six years.”
“MPs’ pay shouldn’t be reformed late at night under Parliamentary urgency. We are calling on the Government to allow a Select Committee process and public input. In the meantime, a taxpayers’ representative should be appointed to the Remuneration Authority so this year’s 5.4% pay hike is not repeated.”
ENDS
ENQUIRIES:
Ben Craven
022 079 2788
NOTES TO EDITORS:
The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is an independent activist group, dedicated to being the voice for Kiwi taxpayers in the corridors of power. It’s here to fight government waste and make sure New Zealanders get value for money from their tax dollar.
The Taxpayers’ Union operates a 24 hour media line for comment on taxpayer issues. Representatives are available on (04) 282 0302.
High resolution images and logos are available on request or online at http://www.taxpayers.org.nz/resources
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]]>Te Pūnaha seminar – The need to complement R&D with market innovations
MIL OSI –
Source: New Zealand Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment MBIE – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Te Pūnaha seminar – The need to complement R&D with market innovations
08 Apr 2015
@ Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, 15 Stout St, Wellington
In the international race to innovate our way to growth and wellbeing, the fact that New Zealand lags behind the OECD average in R&D investments has reinforced the argument that firms and government must invest more heavily in R&D. This view assumes investments in R&D will lead to technology and product innovations that in turn generate economic growth for firms and nations alike. Minds differ on whether governments can pick winners in the R&D race, but few policymakers or businesses question that this is at least the right race to run.
Unfortunately, the path from R&D expenditure to GDP growth is not a straight one, and there are many crucially important intermediating factors that are conveniently left out of the public debate. In fact, New Zealand is among the top countries in the world when it comes to filing patents: third or fourth, depending on whether you compare the number of patents to the country’s GDP or population size. So even with moderate R&D expenditure, New Zealand is punching above its weight in inventing things. What happens after that – turning these inventions into international commercial success stories – is the problem.
The idea that investing in R&D and product innovation generates immediate value originates from a time very different to today – when there was a shortage of everything and the business networks were relatively simple. Now, fast-forwarding some 200-300 years to the current day, and you see a very different reality. There still are unmet customer needs, but the complexity of business networks has increased exponentially. And herein lays the problem.
Customers buy those products that create value to them, and generally this value creation is completely dependent on the market ecosystem in which these products are being used. Let’s for instance consider cars as an example: how much value would a car create to its owner if there were no tyres, petrol stations, service shops, roads, insurances or even traffic laws? All these elements of the car ecosystem did not magically materialize overnight, but entrepreneurs, governments and even activists came together to build them over several decades.
In our research we have focused on investigating this phenomenon: how innovative companies create new market ecosystems around their inventions – or leave out the technological innovation altogether and focus on improving their market ecosystems. In the seminar we also open the floor for a discussion on how public policies could support this crucial piece of the GDP growth puzzle better in the future.
Suvi Nenonen
![[image] Suvi Nenonen.](assets/MSI/Images/_resampled/ResizedImage236275-Suvi.jpg "[image] Suvi Nenonen.")
Suvi Nenonen is Associate Professor at University of Auckland Business School and Associate Professor at Hanken School of Economics in Finland. Her research interests are in markets, market shaping strategies, business model innovation and customer asset management. Prior to entering academics, she has had 10+ years of experience as a strategy consultant to major European companies in several industries such as financial services, manufacturing, healthcare, construction, utility, telecommunications, fast-moving consumer goods industries, and non-profit organisations. Her research has been published in journals such as European Journal of Marketing, British Journal of Management, Industrial Marketing Management, Marketing Theory, and Management Decision.
Kaj Storbacka
![[image] Kaj Storbacka.](assets/MSI/Images/_resampled/ResizedImage213275-Kaj.jpg "[image] Kaj Storbacka.")
Kaj Storbacka is Professor, Markets and Strategy at the University of Auckland Business School’s Graduate School of Management. He has previously been a Professor at the Nyenrode Business Universiteit and at Hanken School of Economics in Finland. His main research focuses on market and business model innovation, market shaping strategies and solution business transformation. Dr Storbacka has made a career out of working on the borderline between academic and applied research within marketing and strategic management. He has 30 years of background as a strategy consultant to European and global companies – in finance, media, travel, retail, utility, manufacturing and telecommunications. His academic research has been published in journals such as Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Industrial Marketing Management, Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, European Journal of Marketing and Market Theory.
Suvi and Kaj are currently conducting a three-year research project for the Royal Society of New Zealand, funded by the Marsden Grant, titled ‘Is New Zealand betting on the wrong horse in the international innovation race? The importance of market innovations for small open economies’.
Their managerial book on the same topic, “Designing Markets: Are you Market Driven or Market Driving” was awarded as the best business book in Finland in 2010.
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]]>NIWA’s research receives international recognition
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Source: NIWA – National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: NIWA’s research receives international recognition
World-class climate and ozone research by scientists at NIWA’s Lauder Atmospheric Research Station has been recognised by meteorology’s leading organisation in Geneva, making Lauder the fourth upper-air site in the world to be certified by the global climate-data network.
Information collected by the weekly launch of the Lauder station’s radiosonde weather and ozone balloon soundings, together with associated ground-based measurements, will receive official Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) Reference Upper Air Network (GRUAN) certification at the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) Congress in Geneva in June. This is a significant international endorsement of the capabilities of Lauder Station as a world-class upper-air measurement site.
Stable, standardised, and well-calibrated atmospheric observations are crucial to documenting climate and climate change. The standard network of upper-air meteorological observations, and also weather satellites, provide relatively good coverage but high-quality observations are needed against which these standard observations can be calibrated. This is the purpose of GRUAN.
For this reason, Lauder is paired with the Invercargill radiosonde site operated by the MetService, which produces twice-daily soundings of the atmosphere.
NIWA’s Lauder Station, near Alexandra in Central Otago, is well-known in the global atmospheric science community for its climate research and joins a select group of research stations with GRUAN-certified measurement programmes – Spitsbergen in Norway, Lindenberg in Germany, Boulder, Colorado, in the US. Sodankyla in Finland was recently certified as the fifth. Presently Lauder is the only such-certified site in the Southern Hemisphere.
Lauder’s certification will be presented to New Zealand’s Permanent Representative to the WMO, Peter Lennox, CEO of MetService, reflecting the expected close collaboration between NIWA and MetService in managing and operating the GRUAN site at Lauder.
Ahead of WMO Congress, an event will be held at Lauder Station on Tuesday 10 March attended by NIWA and MetService executive, scientists and invited media.
For more information please contact:
Richard Querel
NIWA Atmospheric Scientist
+64 3 440 0400
richard.querel@niwa.co.nz
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]]>Auckland Council States Nothing Can Be Done For Titirangi kauri trees
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Source: Auckland Council – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Media statement on Titirangi kauri trees
Auckland Council acknowledges decisions such as the one involving the kauri tree in Titirangi can be challenging says Chief Operating Officer Dean Kimpton.
The council has granted two separate resource consents for construction of two houses on adjoining sites in Paturoa Rd which means the removal of some trees.
Like all such applications, this one was assessed under the Resource Management Act and the District Plan.
“We consulted with the local board and iwi and the final decision to grant the application was made by independent commissioners and we are very aware of the challenging aspects of the decision,” says Mr Kimpton.
“The council followed due process by considering the effects of the tree removal, the ecological value of the sites and the effects of the development itself. An ecologist, arborists, and other experts were involved.”
As part of the process, a range of alternatives was considered and the decision is a balance between minimising the environmental effects with the developer’s expectation he could build on his own property.
The developers have elected to build close to the road which minimises the number of trees that needs to be removed because there will be no long driveways.
“Auckland Council understands people’s desire to protect our natural environment however the zoning on these two sites recognises the right to build while taking the environment into consideration,” says Mr Kimpton.
“Auckland Council has no mandate to revoke the consent and so for this tree nothing can be done.
“However we would strongly urge any person or community group with any concerns about another particular tree or group of trees to check out the Auckland Council website to see if it is ‘scheduled’.
If it is scheduled, the tree is protected and cannot be removed.
If it isn’t scheduled, any member of the public or group can nominate that it be scheduled and go through the robust scheduling process.”
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]]>National Statement – 59th session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women
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Source: New Zealand Government – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: National Statement – 59th session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women
Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa.
I am honoured to present the New Zealand Government’s national statement to the Commission on the Status of Women.
To start, I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge civil society for its contributions to the preparation for this important meeting. In particular, I would like to thank the non-governmental organisations from New Zealand and the Pacific for their contributions to the national and regional preparations.
I reaffirm New Zealand’s strong commitment to the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the Vienna Declaration and Programme for Action, the International Conference on Population and Development, UN Security Council resolution 1325 and subsequent resolutions relating to the women, peace and security agenda.
These commitments have underpinned the positive progress we have made towards gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.
I believe we have many opportunities to make even more of a difference.
As the Secretary General has noted, we are still very far from the vision set in the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action.
The international normative framework has supported good progress across many areas, but this progress has been too slow and uneven.
New challenges have emerged and have compounded existing difficulties experienced by many Member States. Conflict is, in many instances, limiting and sometimes reversing progress, and the violation of the human rights of women and girls remains a too common occurrence.
I am heartened to see so many senior figures from around the globe who have gathered here this week, and I believe this demonstrates that there continues to be a strong commitment to collectively tackle these challenges and remaining gaps.
This show of commitment is particularly important as we give shape to the post-2015 development agenda.
Addressing gender equality, the empowerment of women and the human rights of women and girls in the post-2015 development agenda is essential and necessary to achieving other goals, be that poverty eradication, reduction of inequalities or inclusive economic growth.
2015 marks the thirtieth anniversary of New Zealand’s Ministry for Women. Thirty years on from its establishment in 1984, I am proud that the Ministry maintains a critical role in advising the Government, developing policy, and working with organisations to improve lives for New Zealand women.
Women play an important role in the political, social and economic fabric of New Zealand. Our first-hand experience tells us that empowering women and girls, and achieving gender equality, is critical to the development of a peaceful, secure and prosperous nation.
We also know that investing in women and girls pays off – there is a flow-on effect for families, communities, the workplace and the wider economy.
As a professional woman who is also proud to be a mother, I am grateful to those New Zealand women who worked hard to pave the way so that I am able to participate as an equal in the governance of New Zealand.
That said, as the Minister for Women, I am also conscious that some challenges for New Zealand women remain. In this regard, I want to make sure women have equal opportunities, equal expectations and are of equal value.
In order to do this, my government is focused on these priority areas:
- Supporting women in the workplace and growing women’s participation in the New Zealand economy, particularly through participation in education and training, as well as encouraging employment in non-traditional roles. We will continue to work to reduce the gender pay gap and address unconscious gender bias.
- Growing and developing our future pool of women leaders, by inspiring them to aim high in their careers and take the next step up from where they are now in the workplace.
- Supporting families, through promoting family-friendly and flexible workplaces.
- Preventing violence against women through the primary prevention of violence, and keeping women safe from harm and preventing the first instance of abuse. In addition, we will work across-government to support victims, reduce reoffending and address causes of violence.
The next two years are particularly important for New Zealand as we serve on the UN Security Council. It is an important opportunity for us to contribute to the Council’s efforts to address the gendered impacts of conflict and the role of women in conflict prevention, protection and sustainable peace.
The agenda set out in Beijing is more valid than ever as the realisation of its vision is still a prerequisite for achieving international development, peace and security.
For New Zealand’s part, you can be assured that we remain committed, both at the national and international levels, to turning the vision of Beijing Declaration and Platform for action into reality on the ground.
I look forward to the remainder of the proceedings this week as we work collectively to identify gaps and challenges, share best practices and innovation, and exchange ideas about how we can achieve gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls worldwide.
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]]>Bill to amend leaky homes assistance package
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Source: New Zealand Government – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Bill to amend leaky homes assistance package
The Government is proposing changes to the Financial Assistance Package available under the Weathertight Homes Resolution Services Act to provide clarity of eligibility that will help more owners of leaky homes access assistance, Building and Housing Minister Dr Nick Smith announced today.
“The first change is extending the definition of the ‘built’ date to align with last year’s Osborne v. Auckland City Council decision by the Supreme Court. The High Court and Court of Appeal had previously ruled that the ‘built’ date was the date of the last building inspection, but the Supreme Court determined it was when the code compliance certificate was issued, a date which in some cases is many months, and sometimes years later. This affects who is eligible for assistance, given the 10-year limitation on claims. The Bill will enable about 70 homeowners previously deemed ineligible to be able to pursue their claim without the expense of individually taking each case through the courts,” Dr Smith says.
“The second change relates to the expiry of the Financial Assistance Package, which is due to occur on 23 July 2016. It is possible that by this date, some claims may still not have reached the ‘notice to proceed’ stage, which is the critical point of the claim process. The Bill will mean homeowners who are actively progressing claims in the system as of 23 July 2016 will be able to continue to do so, rather than have the expiry date arbitrarily prevent a claim from proceeding where good progress is being made.
“The third change is aimed at removing any doubt about the validity of the eligibility criteria for access to the Financial Assistance Package. Two of the criteria – 1B and 1C – are presently located in the Gazette notice by regulation, which the High Court has raised concerns about. The Bill consequently moves them into the Act to provide a greater deal of legal certainty so that their validity cannot be questioned. Previous decisions made on the basis of these two criteria will be validated.
“These changes provide sensible refinements to the Act. The Bill will have its first reading today and then be referred to select committee for the public to make submissions,” Dr Smith concluded.
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]]>Peters Continues His Force For The North Bus Tour
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Source: New Zealand First – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Force For The North Bus Tour Schedule – Tuesday 10 March
New Zealand First Leader and Northland candidate Rt Hon Winston Peters will visit the Kauri Saleyards, between Hikurangi and Whangarei, at 10.45am.
The Force for the North bus tour will be in Whakapara, Helena Bay, Oakura Bay and Whangaruru in the afternoon.
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]]>PhD captures secret to cricket’s success
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Source: Massey University – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: PhD captures secret to cricket’s success
At least 10 players in the current Black Caps squad came through the cricket development programmes and competitions implemented by Alec Astle while Cricket New Zealand’s national development manager.
Alec Astle with his Bert Sutcliffe Medal
for outstanding services to cricket.
With all eyes currently on the Black Caps and their bid for World Cup glory, it is easy to forget how important grassroots participation is to the ongoing sustainability of any sport.
No one knows this better than Alec Astle, who has just completed his PhD thesis on how New Zealand Cricket revitalised its sport in the face of declining player levels in the late 1990s. The organisation’s player census figures show that player numbers grew from 75,479 when its development programme launched in 2000 to 112,000 players by 2012.
Mr Astle was New Zealand Cricket’s national development manager for 10 years and he embarked on his doctorate to capture everything he had learned about sport development in the process.
“There’s very little academic literature on sport development globally or academic training for practitioners working in community sport,” Mr Astle says.
“Training to grow and develop a sport so that it attracts and retains more participants at all levels is just not available in New Zealand.”
As a former teacher, deputy principal and cricket coach at Palmerston North Boys’ High School for 24 years, Mr Astle was determined to produce an academic study of sport development to fill the gap. He hopes to get parts of his thesis published in academic journals and to also produce an accessible textbook for sports administrators.
“Most sports practitioners are just too busy to undertake a project like this; I’m hoping my research will help other sporting organisations to revitalise, strengthen and grow their community-based foundations.”
Mr Astle says that in the past the national bodies of many sports focused on the development of elite athletes and teams, while their sports at a community level were predominantly run by volunteers.
“This traditional approach came under pressure from a range of societal changes, including different patterns of work, which meant people weren’t able to volunteer as much anymore. There was no national system of support for people who loved the sport purely for its own sake. It was more about preparing representative players and not lifelong participation for the majority of players at all levels.”
While he was New Zealand Cricket’s national development manager, Mr Astle developed a plan, programme and various pathways for players and coaches to cater for both competitive and social players in clubs and schools.
“Sports need programmes that aren’t intimidating if they want to capture parents and young players. Cricket began to provide support for parents to coach and kids to play, growing their skills over time.”
He says that while the efforts of enthusiastic volunteers are irreplacable, they need support and resources, especially if programmes are to maintain their quality across the country.
“My study shows that successful sport development requires a clear vision and leadership that takes a holistic view of the sport. You need a national plan that creates pathways for all players to develop and enjoy their sport and those pathways need to be surrounded by similarly aligned pathways for coaches, officials and adminstrators.
“Organisations also need to have a long-term commitment – there’s no point in one-off initiatives that run out of steam because of a lack of perseverance or resources.”
Mr Astle says the sport is capitalising on the Black Caps current success at the World Cup, in part, because of the years of development work by New Zealand Cricket over the past 15 years – programmes he helped to develop and implement.
“More than half of the current Black Caps and White Ferns teams have come through cricket development programmes and competitions,” he says.
“A good sport development plan widens and deepens the base of players in a supportive environment that makes the sport fun for everyone, especially at the entry level. Programmes need to be relevant and appealing if they are to attract, nurture and retain players.”
The 2015 Cricket World Cup has come at the perfect time for the sport in New Zealand. Player participation rates are high and the intense interest in the event provides a massive opportunity to attract more players to the game, Mr Astle says.
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]]>AA welcomes progress on Waikato Expressway
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Source: AA – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: AA welcomes progress on Waikato Expressway
The AA welcomes today’s announcement that work on the final three sections of the Waikato Expressway will begin this year.
Funding has been approved for the Hamilton and Longswamp sections of the Expressway, while a consortium has been appointed to deliver the Huntly section. That means that all seven sections will either be completed, under construction, or will have gone out to the market by the end of 2015.
AA spokesman Barney Irvine said it was great to see the project reach the home straight.
“We’ve already seen the benefits of the work carried out so far,” he said. “Once the whole project is finished, it will be a game-changer for economic growth, safety, and travel times in this part of the country.”
Mr Irvine said the project was the result of strong collaboration between a range of stakeholders in the wider Waikato region.
“Everyone’s on board, because they understand just how important this project is,” he said.
Mr Irvine added that the AA was delighted with the steady progress of the roll-out of the Government’s wider Roads of National Significance (RoNS) programme, which includes the Waikato Expressway and six other roading projects.
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]]>Fast food workers of the world unite
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Source: Unite Union New Zealand – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Fast food workers of the world unite
Unite members have access to exclusive benefits, including free and discounted services and great savings using their Unite membership card. Click on the image above to visit our Members Services website at www.uba.og.nz to register and find out why it pays to belong.
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]]>International Women’s Day: Global standards needed to stop violence against women
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Source: Unite Union New Zealand – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: International Women’s Day: Global standards needed to stop violence against women
10
Mar
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]]>Retail card spending up
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Source: Statistics New Zealand – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Retail card spending up
Retail spending using electronic cards was up $160 million (3.8 percent) to $4.4 billion in February 2015 compared with February 2014, Statistics New Zealand said today.
In actual terms, card spending rose in all retail industries except for fuel.
When adjusted for seasonal effects, retail spending was up 1.0 percent in February 2015 compared with January 2015. This rise follows small falls in each of the previous three months.
“After removing seasonal effects, spending rose in five of the six retail industries,” business indicators manager Neil Kelly said. “Hospitality and durables had the largest rises, while fuel rose for the first time in three months.”
Core retail spending (which excludes the vehicle-related industries) rose 1.2 percent in February 2015, following a 1.0 percent rise in January 2015.
The total value of electronic card spending, including the two non-retail industries (services and other non-retail), rose 0.4 percent. This rise follows a 0.1 percent rise in January 2015.
Trends for the total, retail, and core retail series have generally been rising since these series began in October 2002, although the total and retail series have eased in recent months.
This data is not adjusted for price changes and is available only at the national level.
Ends
For media enquiries contact: Neil Kelly, Christchurch 03 964 8700, info@stats.govt.nz
Authorised by Liz MacPherson, Government Statistician, 10 March 2015
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]]>Safer children’s workforce guidelines launched
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Source: New Zealand Government – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Safer children’s workforce guidelines launched
Social Development Minister Anne Tolley today launched two new guidelines for agencies and organisations working with children as part of the Government’s Children’s Action Plan.
The Guidelines; Safer Recruitment, Safer Children and Safer Organisations, Safer Children advise on how employers of the children’s workforce can consistently recruit safe people to work with children, and how to develop good child protection policies that enable their workers to better identify and respond to the needs vulnerable children.
Mrs Tolley launched the guidelines in Hamilton with local leaders, community groups and those setting up the new Hamilton Children’s Team.
“Every child has the right to be safe from abuse and neglect and these guidelines will help us build a stronger culture of child protection across New Zealand where the safety and security of children is paramount.
“By far the majority of our children’s workforce is safe and conscientious but we know predators target opportunities to be around children – these guidelines provide practical steps to help organisations to manage against that risk,” said Mrs Tolley.
The Vulnerable Children Act 2014 requires state sector agencies who work with children, and the organisations they fund to have child protection policies in place and will phase in a requirement for all paid children’s workers to be safety checked in a consistent way.
Mrs Tolley paid tribute to Child Matters for co-producing the safety checking guidelines Safer Recruitment, Safer Children.
“The Children’s Action Plan is about government and communities working together to better support vulnerable children. These guidelines are an example of that innovative partnership.”
“The Hamilton Children’s Team will be the country’s first large urban team following the establishment of Children’s Teams in Rotorua, Whangarei, Horowhenua/Ōtaki and Marlborough.
“When it is fully up and running, the Hamilton Children’s Team will be the first big team of frontline practitioners supporting around 1,400 vulnerable children and their families,” Mrs Tolley said.
“Hamilton is renowned for its strong community sector and as a result is well placed to test new initiatives being developed as part of the Children’s Action Plan.
The region will trial the Vulnerable Kids Information System (Viki) under an Approved Information Sharing Agreement as well as a new Hub triage process to better coordinate services and information for at risk children.
“Today’s launch marks exciting progress in a new children protection system for the country that will prioritise the needs of our most vulnerable children helping ensure they get the right services at the right time to be happy, healthy and safe,” said Mrs Tolley.
For more information on the Children’s Action Plan and guidelines: http://childrensactionplan.govt.nz/
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]]>Health Warning – toxic algae found in Ashley River/ Rakahuri at SH1 Bridge
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Source: Environment Canterbury Regional Council – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Health Warning – toxic algae found in Ashley River/ Rakahuri at SH1 Bridge
The Community and Public Health division of the Canterbury District Health board has issued a health warning after the potentially toxic blue-green algae cyanobacteria Lyngbya and Phormidium was found in the Ashley River/ Rakahuri at the State Highway One (SH1) Bridge.
People and animals, particularly dogs, should avoid the Ashley River/ Rakahuri at the SH1 Bridge until the health warning has been lifted.
Dr Alistair Humphrey, Canterbury Medical Officer of Health, says the algae look like dark brown to black mats and can produce toxins harmful to people and animals.
“Exposure may cause skin rashes, nausea, stomach cramps, tingling and numbness around the mouth and fingertips,” Dr Humphrey says.
“If you experience any of these symptoms, visit your doctor immediately, also let your doctor know if you’ve had contact with dark brown/black algal mats or water in this area.”
Dr Humphrey says reticulated town water supplies are currently safe but no one should drink the water from the river at any time.
“Even after boiling the water from the river, it does not remove the toxin therefore should not be consumed,” he says.
Animals showing signs of illness after coming into contact with algal mats should be taken to a vet immediately.
People should remain out of the waterways until the warnings have been lifted.
Environment Canterbury is monitoring the sites and the public will be advised of any changes in water quality.
Facts about cyanobacteria:
- Appears as dark brown/black mats attached to rocks along the riverbed
- The algae occur naturally but can increase rapidly during warmer months
- It often has a strong musty smell and algal toxin concentrations can vary over short periods with changing environmental conditions
- Although high river levels will remove the algal bloom, detached mats can accumulate along the shore and increase the risk of exposure to toxins
- If a health warning is in place avoid contact with the water
- Although district or city councils may place warning signs, these may not be seen at the numerous river access points, hence the need for people/ dog-walkers to treat every low-flowing river cautiously.
For further information visit River warnings for toxic algae or contact Community and Public Health on (03) 364 1777.
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]]>German educators take to the streets demanding better work conditions
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Source: Global Unions – Press Releases/Statement:
Headline: German educators take to the streets demanding better work conditions
09 March 2015
Education International’s delegation to the 59th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women marched alongside thousands of activists through New York Sunday for gender equality and the rights of women and girls.
09 March 2015
The Gewerkschaft Erziehung und Wissenschaft, together with other public sector unions, is organising strikes across Germany in pursuit of a salary increase and a collective agreement for the 200,000 teachers employed in public schools.
06 March 2015
In February, Education International organized national conversations on the issues affecting teacher effectiveness in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Senegal, part of a programme aimed at boosting teacher unions’ promotion of quality education.
06 March 2015
2015 is an auspicious year for International Women’s Day celebrations: we mark the 20th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the most advanced document on women’s rights and empowerment ever signed by world leaders.
See a list of all the news
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USA: Young Adult And Teen Suicide Rates Nearly Double In Rural Areas Compared To Urban Areas
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Source: US Rural Assistance Center – Health and Human Services News 3 – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Young Adult And Teen Suicide Rates Nearly Double In Rural Areas Compared To Urban Areas
In the past, rural teens have been more likely to kill themselves as compared to their urban counterparts. Is the same true today, now that technology has woven us together more tightly? Sadly and surprisingly yes: Between the years 1996 and 2010, a new study finds, the rates of suicide among teens and young-adults ranged twice as high in country settings compared to city areas. In fact, the suicide rate in rural areas is nearly double that in cities… and rising.
Constantly, we are told that technology has made us more connected — certainly the Internet has improved our ability to access knowledge and culture, and so today we more easily bridge the potential differences between countries, continents, languages, and cultures. In fact, anyone with a computer and an Internet connection can view a class in biology at UC Berkeley or learn about ancient Greek culture at Yale. For those of a more artistic bent, movies can be made (and promoted) with a simple smartphone while an endless number of instructional YouTube videos exist for those wishing to learn how to draw, paint, or throw pottery. There would seem to be no reason anyone would feel hopeless — ever.
Sadly, this is not the case, as researchers from The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center discovered.
“We were not surprised by the higher rates in rural areas,” Dr. Cynthia Fontanella, clinical assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral health and lead author of the study, told Medical Daily in an email. “What was surprising is that the gap/disparity is widening over time. As for the advances in technology, although more technology is available, the ‘playing field’ is not necessarily level due to differences in the culture surrounding rural life.” By this she meant country folk more than city folk may be influenced by the stigma surrounding mental health and a perceived need to be self reliant. “This is much slower to change than the technology,” Fontanella commented.
An analysis of data derived from the National Center for Health Statistics found, for people between the ages of 10 and 24 in the United States, “suicide was the third leading cause of death in 2010 behind only unintentional injuries and homicide,” stated the authors of the newly published research. From 1996 through 2010, 66,595 young people between age 10 and 24 died by suicide. Probing these numbers, the researchers discovered the rural versus urban suicide rate among males was nearly 20 and 10 for every 100,000, respectively, and for females, slightly more than 4 and 2 for every 100,000, respectively. A little more than half (51.1 percent) of all suicides involved a gun, while a third (33.9 percent) died by hanging; disproportionately, more rural youths killed themselves in these two ways.
Dramatically, suicide rates were found to be four times higher for young men than young women.
The researchers attribute the differences in self-destruction rates as due to rural people having less access to mental health services, more access to lethal means (guns), greater isolation, and the social/economic trends working against them — between 1990 and 2010, for instance, “nonmetropolitan counties lost population through out-migration and decreased birth rates,” noted the authors in their study. No jobs during the recession compelled many to move to cities, with those left behind feeling increasingly isolated. About 90 percent of those who commit suicide suffer from a major psychiatric problem such as depression or bipolar disorder, the researchers say, while substance abuse, which increases impulsivity and messes with mood, factors into many other deaths.
The researchers suggest school-based interventions as well as telemental health — using technology to provide counseling services, say — could help identify those at risk and provide better monitoring.
“Access to mental health care in rural areas is a key issue; many rural counties do not have even one psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker serving the region,” Fontanella told Medical Daily. “This lack of access can compound the severity of illness. People living in rural areas have to travel longer distances to see health care practitioners and wait longer for appointments, so by the time they receive care they may have developed more serious conditions.”
Source: Fontanella C, Hiance-Steelesmith DL, Phillips GS, et al. Widening Rural-Urban Disparities in Youth Suicides, United States, 1996-2010. JAMA Pediatrics. 2015.
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NASA Holds Teleconference on Hubble Observations of Jupiter’s Largest Moon
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Source: NASA – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: NASA Holds Teleconference on Hubble Observations of Jupiter’s Largest Moon
NASA Holds Teleconference on Hubble Observations of Jupiter’s Largest Moon | NASA
[image-36]
NASA will host a teleconference at 11 a.m. EDT on Thursday, March 12, to discuss Hubble Space Telescope’s observations of Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon. These results will help scientists in the search for habitable worlds beyond Earth.
Participants in the teleconference will be:
- Jim Green, director of Planetary Science, NASA Headquarters, Washington
- Joachim Saur, professor for geophysics, University of Cologne, Germany
- Jennifer Wiseman, Hubble senior project scientist, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland
- Heidi Hammel, executive vice president, Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Washington
To participate by phone, reporters must contact Felicia Chou at 202-358-0257 or felicia.chou@nasa.gov and provide their media affiliation no later than noon Wednesday.
Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live on NASA’s website at:
http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio
For information about NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/hubble
For information about our solar system, including Jupiter and Ganymede, visit:
https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/
-end-
This image of Ganymede, one of Jupiter’s moons and the largest moon in our solar system was taken by NASA’s Galileo spacecraft.
Page Last Updated: March 9th, 2015
Page Editor: Sarah Ramsey
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The Latest Washington Report on the Hemisphere is out
MIL OSI Analysis –
Source: Council on Hemispheric Affairs – Analysis-Reportage:
Headline: The Latest Washington Report on the Hemisphere is out
In the latest issue, you will find the following analyses:
Articles:
1-“2016 Río Olympics: Impending Doom?” by Research Associate Erica Illingworth
2- “The Battle for Quinoa: The Bittersweet Reality of Globalization” by Research Associate Timothy Keen
3-“Fear Penetrating Guatemalan Education System” by Research Associate Cameron McKibben
4-“On Abortion Law in Latin America” by Research Associate Chen Jiang
5-“2015: The Year Bolivians Protested Over The Simpsons” by Senior Research Fellow Alejandro Sanchez
Country Briefs:
1-“The Bahamas and Anti Haitian Immigration” by Research Associate Melanie Diaz
2-“Uruguay, and Guantanamo Prisoners” by Research Associate Timothy Keen
More information about the Washington Report on the Hemisphere:
For over 35 years, the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, led by its long-time director and a former professor, Larry Birns, has striven to produce the most in-depth analysis of a full range of inter-American issues. All of its findings are regularly incorporated into its highly regarded 30-year-old biweekly publication, the Washington Report on the Hemisphere.
The Council on Hemispheric Affairs’ biweekly publication, the Washington Report on the Hemisphere (WRH) is widely considered to be one of the most respected and reliable publications of its kind. Circulating since 1980, the WRH has a far-reaching audience consisting of academics, regional analysts, and editorial page editors, corporate vice presidents for Latin American operations, senior financial officers, respected journalists and diplomats throughout the globe.
You can subscribe to the Washington Report on the Hemisphere on the following link:
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Murder, Espionage, and Debt in Argentina
MIL OSI Analysis –
Source: Council on Hemispheric Affairs – Analysis-Reportage:
Headline: Murder, Espionage, and Debt in Argentina
By: James A. Baer, Senior Research Fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs
President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner asked Argentina’s congress to restructure completely the nation’s intelligence service and on February 26 both houses passed the bill, authorizing the country’s new Federal Intelligence Agency. This comes after weeks of speculation, suspicion and protests over the unexplained and unsolved death of federal prosecutor, Alberto Nisman, who was about to testify against the president, accusing her and foreign minister, Héctor Timerman, of covering up their dealings with the Iranian government regarding the 1994 bombing of the Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA), Argentina’s principal Jewish community center in downtown Buenos Aires that left 85 dead and hundreds injured. It was the most serious case of terrorism in Argentina’s history, and raised concerns about safety among the country’s nearly 250,000 Jewish residents. Nisman’s 300 page indictment charged that Kirchner’s creation in 2013 of a Truth Commission to investigate the AMIA bombing was an attempt to end the investigation so that the government could obtain badly-needed Iranian oil. So far, there is no proof of such collusion and Kirchner’s administration vehemently responded that there was no cover-up and no attempt to derail the investigation. Federal judges Ariel Lijo and Daniel Rafecas refused to proceed with the indictment. On March 4 a federal prosecutor now heading the investigation of cover-up appealed that decision. On March 6 the Argentine government took out a full-page “legal notice” in the Washington Post to explain its position. Nevertheless, there is more than a little confusion about Nisman’s death as well as anger and frustration that the government cannot resolve the mystery.
President Kirchner’s reaction to Nisman’s death has been inconsistent. At first she publically stated that she believed Nisman committed suicide. Then, a few days later, she announced that she believed he was murdered in a plot against her. Meanwhile, the investigation of Nisman’s death has not produced a definitive explanation and conspiracy theories still abound. Protest marches and demonstrations ensued with angry Argentines banging pots and holding up signs saying, “I am Nisman.”
The issue underlying the recent chaos and confusion is the widespread mistrust of the Argentine government over the still unresolved bombings of the AMIA and the Israeli embassy in 1992 that killed 29 and injured 250. Many Argentines do not trust their president to proceed with transparency in the investigation, just as they did not trust her earlier economic policies, in which she threatened to jail any economist who reported correct inflation figures. On the other hand, many Argentines do agree with their president about the so-called “Vulture Funds” that threatened to undo a carefully negotiated debt restructuring plan. Recently the hedge funds agreed to negotiate with the Argentine government, but the ongoing conflict has depressed the economy and created uncertainty. Kirchner has less than one year left in her term and cannot be re-elected for a third consecutive term. She has become the objectification of all that is wrong in Argentina at present.
The national intelligence service is a case in point. President Juan D. Perón created the agency in 1946 in order to bring the state and military intelligence agencies under one organization to handle both internal and external intelligence-gathering bodies. Originally called Coordinación de Informaciones de Estado, Coordination of State Information (CIDE), its name was changed to Secretaría de Informaciones de Estado, Secretariat of State Information (SIDE) in 1956 after the Liberating Revolution staged by the military to oust Perón. During the period of military rule (1976-1983) and the “Dirty War” in which Argentina’s military government murdered members of the opposition as well as thousands of union leaders and students, SIDE was responsible for identifying those deemed to be enemies of the regime. Renamed Secretaría de Inteligencia de Estado in 1976 by General Ongania, the agency focused more on rooting out subversives within Argentina than on international issues. “Operación Condor” was a cooperative effort between Argentina’s SIDE and the intelligence services in Brazil and Chile, which were also under military dictatorships at the time. Its focus was identifying enemies of these Southern Cone military regimes and returning them for prosecution. After the end of Argentina’s military regime in 1983 the agency continued to operate, but with a greater focus on national security rather than internal issues. In 2001 the agency was reorganized with a number of agents removed and others suspected of perpetrating human rights abuses. In 2003 Nestor Kirchner ordered a crackdown on illegal wiretaps undertaken by the agency.
Despite the attempts at reform, Argentina’s intelligence agency has struggled to gain respect and support from the country’s citizens. The inability of the agency to apprehend the perpetrators of the 1992 bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires and the 1994 community center bombing angered many Argentines. Twelve Argentines were accused of assisting the suicide bomber in the AMIA attack, but acquitted. Carlos Menem, president of Argentina at the time, was accused in 2012 of destroying evidence that might have incriminated him. He was later found guilty of arms smuggling, but had immunity as a sitting senator and has appealed the case to the country’s Supreme Court. Nisman brought evidence to show that the Iranian-supported Hezbollah carried out the bombings, and identified a 21-year-old, Lebanese citizen Ibrahim Hussein Berro as the suicide bomber. Nevertheless, no arrests have been made. President Kirchner blamed rogue agents within the agency for providing information to Nisman about her involvement in a cover-up to discredit her administration politically, and asked congress to dissolve the intelligence agency.
The new Federal Intelligence Agency provides Kirchner with the opportunity to purge the organization of those she mistrusts or who are inept. But a new name for the intelligence service will do little to restore trust in her sinking administration. Despite Kirchner’s claim to the legacy of Perón and the Peronist (Justicialist) Party, it is unclear whether or not she will have any influence in the upcoming presidential elections scheduled for October 25, 2015. Many Argentines just want her gone.
The demonstrations, the accusations, the economic chaos, the suicide or murder of Nisman and the ineptitude of the intelligence agency in tracking down those responsible for Argentina’s worst case of terrorism are all related to Argentines’ feelings of anger and frustration over Kirchner’s administration and a desire for new leadership to replace her.
By: James A. Baer, Senior Research Fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs
Please accept this article as a free contribution from COHA, but if re-posting, please afford authorial and institutional attribution. Exclusive rights can be negotiated. For additional news and analysis on Latin America, please go to: LatinNews.com and Rights Action.
Featured Image: Administración Nacional de la Seguridad Social, “PRO.CRE.AR. 1 Año – 13.06.2013,” Flickr Creative Commons, Retrieved from: https://www.flickr.com/photos/ansesgob/9042028950.
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UNFPA Launches Comprehensive Guide on Reporting on Gender-Based Violence
MIL OSI –
Source: United Nations Population Fund – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: UNFPA Launches Comprehensive Guide on Reporting on Gender-Based Violence
AMMAN, 9 March 2015–UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, has launched a handbook for journalists called, “Reporting on Gender-Based Violence (GBV) in the Syria Crisis”. The handbook draws from real-life scenarios to highlight violations of human rights and international humanitarian law affecting women in conflicts. It provides guidance to journalists on how to cover these violations, including by giving some cultural and psychological background that they may wish to consider during difficult exchanges with survivors of gender-based violence. It was developed in collaboration with a select group of journalists and experts in the area of gender-based violence, with the support of the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID).
The handbook is the first comprehensive collection of practical recommendations for journalists reporting on gender-based violence in the context of Syria crisis, but can also apply to other conflicts. It builds on internationally recognized ethical principles and gives an overview of techniques that can help respect the safety, confidentiality and dignity of survivors and their families and communities. It includes technical terms, ethical questions and practical concerns associated with covering gender-based violence.
The handbook is available to view and download here:
http://www.unfpa.org/resources/reporting-gender-based-violence-syria-cri…
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Hatra destruction ‘war crime,’ says UN chief in wake of ISIL destruction of heritage site
MIL OSI –
Source: United Nations 2 – Press Release/Statement:
Headline: Hatra destruction ‘war crime,’ says UN chief in wake of ISIL destruction of heritage site
7 March 2015 and bulldozing of the ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud and the Director General of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation also stated her outrage at the latest attack.
“The destruction of Hatra marks a turning point in the appalling strategy of cultural cleansing underway in Iraq,” said Irina Bokova in a statement released jointly with the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ISESCO) Director General, Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri.
“With this latest act of barbarism against Hatra, Daesh [ISIL] shows the contempt in which it holds the history and heritage of Arab people, which had been rightly recognized as a World Heritage site,” the statement said.
Hatra, a large fortified city under the influence of the Parthian Empire, withstood invasions by the Romans in 116CE and 198CE thanks to its high, thick walls reinforced by towers. The remains of the city, especially the temples where Hellenistic and Roman architecture blend with Eastern decorative features, attest to the greatness of its civilization.
The statement said this latest direct attack on the history of Islamic Arab cities confirms the role of destruction of heritage in the propaganda of extremists groups.
It also drew attention to the cultural toll paid during the conflict, noting that, in addition to the tragic loss of human life and the humanitarian crisis, persecution of cultural and religious minorities, as well as the targeting of cultural heritage for intentional destruction have been practised, with the aim of erasing the history of the country and thus undermining the peaceful coexistence of diverse communities.
“UNESCO and ISESCO are fully mobilized to respond to this emergency and stand ready to assist the Iraqi authorities in any possible way,” said Mrs Bokova and Mr. Altwaijri.
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Asian diversity welcome in Auckland
Headline: Asian diversity welcome in Auckland
Minister for Ethnic Communities Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga has welcomed a new report which details the overwhelmingly positive influence Auckland’s increasing Asian population is having on the city.
The “Asian Auckland: The Multiple Meanings of Diversity” report by the Asia New Zealand Foundation has revealed the increasing diversity of Auckland’s Asian communities.
The report calls Auckland one of the world’s “super-diverse” cities, a name Mr Lotu-Iiga says ushers in an exciting new era for the city.
“As Minister for Ethnic Communities, and as the MP for the ethnically diverse electorate for Maungakiekie, I welcome this report which underlines the positive influences and the diverse contribution these Asian populations have.
“From the fine food, colourful festivals and the arts, our Asian communities are a welcome addition to our cultural landscape. They bring colour, culture and diversity to our city.
Our government is committed to ensuring New Zealand’s ethnic diversity is embraced, supported and celebrated,” Mr Lotu-Iiga says.
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