In this the sixth episode of A View from Afar for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul G. Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will present a two-part episode to analyse what to make of New Zealand Prime Minister, Chris Hipkins’ bilateral meetings with People’s Republic of China’s President Xi JinPing and other leaders of the PRC.

In part one, we will also consider how the PRC-NZ trade relationship will be seen in the eyes of New Zealand’s security partners.

Then, in the second half of today’s podcast, Paul and Selwyn will analyse the most recent events in Russia – events that have taken shape since Wagner Commander Yevgeny Prigozhin’s pronounced intent to mobilise his mercenaries against the Russian Federation’s top two military heads, and, while doing so, pronounced that the Kremlin’s decision to invade Ukraine was based on falsehoods.

What should we expect next? What is the real state of Putinism? What do the political and power elites in Russia make of President Vladimir Putin’s handling of the matter?

Weeks prior to this event happening inside Russia, Paul and Selwyn analysed the question: How stable is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hold on power? It’s a question that all those who watch Russian affairs have now been confronted with.

In this episode Paul and Selwyn will unpack the complexity, look at what has changed as opposed to what has been said, and consider the effect Russian instability has on NATO and BRICS aligned states.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Paul and Selwyn deep dive into the battle to control a narrative, waged by all sides in a polarised combative world, and how modern mainstream media institutions, like Radio New Zealand, fall vulnerable in the absence of robust all-sides-considered analysis and debate.

In this episode, Paul and Selwyn analyse how fourth Estate bias, propaganda, and conflict-force fact-vacuums are the challenge of our times in this disinformation age.

Upon this context, Paul and Selwyn consider:

* Why Is the Radio New Zealand sub-editor pro-RU-content debacle symptomatic of a fact-vacuum environment?

* Why is all media vulnerable to disinformation in the absence of robust NATO-Ukraine-Russia analysis?

* What are the unspoken of ‘big picture’ shifts in Russian Federation / Global South relations?

LINKS and REFERENCES:

• https://KiwiPolitico.com
• https://www.dekoder.org/de/person/ekaterina-schulmann-0
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/media/180
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/news-extras/story/2018893905/rnz-editorial-audit
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/top/491788/nz-entering-ukraine-conflict-at-whim-of-govt-former-labour-general-secretary
• https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/02/25/russia-ends-nowhere-they-say
• https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/why-russian-elites-think-putins-war-is-doomed-to-fail

INTERACTION:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

You can continue to interact with this podcast, simply by going to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

MEDIAWATCH: By Colin Peacock, RNZ Mediawatch presenter

The comedians on 7 Days had a few laughs at RNZ’s expense against a backdrop of the Kremlin on TV Three this week.

“A Radio New Zealand digital journalist has been stood down after it emerged they’d been editing news stories on the broadcaster’s website to give them a pro-Russian slant, which is kind of disgusting,” host Jeremy Corbett said.

“You’d never get infiltration like that on 7 Days. Our security is too strong. Strong like a bear. Strong like the glorious Russian state and its leader Putin,” he said.

“I love this Russian strategy: ‘First, we take New Zealand’s fourth best and fourth most popular news site — then the world!” said Melanie Bracewell, who said she had not kept up with the news.

Just a joke, obviously, but this week some people have been asking if Kremlin campaigns played a role in the inappropriate editing of online world news.

It was on June 9 that the revelation of it kicked off a media frenzy about propaganda, misinformation, Russia, Ukraine, truth, trust and editorial standards that has been no laughing matter at RNZ.

The story went up a notch last weekend when TVNZ’s Thomas Mead revealed Ukrainian New Zealander Michael Lidski — along with 20 others — had complained about a story written by the journalist in May 2022, which RNZ had re-edited on the day to add alternative perspectives after prompting from an RNZ journalist who considered it sub-standard.

The next day on RNZ’s Checkpoint, presenter Lisa Owen said the suspended RNZ web journalist had told her he edited reports “in that way for five years” — and nobody had ever queried it or told him to stop.

RNZ chief executive Paul Thompson, who is also editor-in-chief, then told Checkpoint he did not consider what he had called “pro-Kremlin garbage” a resignation-worthy issue.

“I think this is a time for us actually working together to fix the problem,” he said.

RNZ had already begun taking out the trash in public by listing the corrupted (and now corrected) stories on the RNZ.co.nz homepage as they are discovered.

Thompson said the problem was “confined to a small area of what RNZ does” but by the following day,  RNZ found six more stories — supplied originally by the reputable news agency Reuters — had also been edited in terms more favourable to the ruling regimes.

“RNZ has come out with a statement that said: ‘In our defence, we didn’t actually realise anyone was reading our stories’,” said 7 Days’ Jeremy Corbett.

That was just a gag — but it did actually explain just how it took so long for the dodgy edits to come to light and become newsworthy.

Where the problem lay
Last Wednesday’s cartoon in the Stuff papers — featuring an RNZ radio newsreader with a Pinocchio-length nose didn’t raise any laughs there either — because none of the slanted stories in question ever went out in the news on the air.

They were only to be found online — and this was a significant distinction as it turned out, because the checks and balances are not quite the same or made by the same staff.

“In radio, a reporter writes a story and sends it to a sub-editor who will then check it. And then a news reader has to read it so there’s a couple of stages. Maybe even a chief reporter would have checked it as well,” Corin Dann told RNZ Morning Report listeners last Monday.

“What I’m trying to establish is what sort of checks and balances were there to ensure that that world story was properly vetted,” he said.

That question — and others — will now be asked by the external experts appointed this week to run the rule of RNZ’s online publishing procedures for a review that will be made public.

On Thursday a former RNZer Brent Edwards made a similar point in the National Business Review where he’ is now the political editor.

“For a couple of years, I was the director of news gathering. I had a large responsibility for RNZ’s news coverage but technically I had no responsibility whatsoever for what went on the web,” he said.

“Done properly the RNZ review panel could do all news media a favour by providing a template for how online news should be curated. It should reinforce the importance of quality, ethical journalism,” Edwards added.

His NBR colleague Dita di Boni said “there but for the grace of God go other outlets” which have “gone digital” in news.

“I worked at TVNZ and there was a rush to digital as well with lots of resources going in but little oversight from the main newsroom.”

Calls for political action
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has made it clear he doesn’t want the government involved in RNZ’s editorial affairs.

David Seymour of the ACT party wanted an inquiry — and NZ First leader Winston Peters called for a Royal Commission into the media bias and manipulation.

Former National MP Nathan Guy told Newshub Nation this weekend “heads need to roll” at RNZ.

“If I was the broadcasting minister, I would want the chair in my office and to hold RNZ to account. I want timeframes. I want accountability because we just can’t afford to have our public broadcaster tell unfortunate mistruths to the public,” he said.

In the same discussion, Newsroom’s co-editor Mark Jennings reminded Guy that RNZ’s low-budget digital news transition happened under his National-led government which froze RNZ’s funding for almost a decade.

“This is what happens when you underfund an organisation for so long,” he said.

Jennings also said “trust in RNZ has been hammered by this” — and criticised RNZ chairman Dr Jim Mather for declining to be interviewed on Newshub Nation.

Earlier — under the headline Media shooting itself in the foot — Jennings said surveys have picked up a decline and trust and news media here.

“And the road back for the media just had a major speed bump,” he concluded.

How deep is the damage to trust?

While the breach of editorial standards is clear, has there been an over-reaction to what may be the actions of just one employee, which took years to come to light?

Last week the think-tank Koi Tū: The Centre for Informed Futures at Auckland University hosted a timely “disinformation and media manipulation” workshop attended by executives and editors from most major media outlets.

It was arranged long before RNZs problems arose — but those ended up dominating discussion on this theme.

Among the participants was media consultant and commentator Peter Bale, who has previously worked overseas for Reuters, as well as The Financial Times and CNN.

“I really feel for RNZ in this, for the chief executive and everybody else there who does generally a great job. The issue of trust here is in this person’s relationship with their employer and their relationship with the facts.”

Bale is also the newsroom initiative leader at the International News Media Association, which promotes best practice in news and journalism publishing.

The exposure of the “inappropriate editing” undetected for so long has created the impression a lot of content is published online with no checking. That is sometimes the case when speed is a priority, but the vast majority of stuff does go past at least two eyes before publication.

“I think it is true also that editing has been diminished as a skill. But I don’t think it’s necessarily a failure of editing here but a failure of this person’s understanding of what their job is,” Bale told Mediawatch.

“You shouldn’t necessarily need to have a second or third pair of eyes when processing a Reuters story that’s already gone through multiple editors. The critical issue for RNZ is whether they took the initial complaints seriously enough,” he said.

‘Pro-Kremlin garbage’?

There have been many reports in recent years about Russia seeding misinformation and disinformation abroad.

Last Tuesday, security and technology consultant Paul Buchanan told Morning Report that RNZ should be better prepared for authoritarian states seeking to mess with its news.

“This incident that prompted this investigation may or may not be just one individual who has certain opinions about the war between Russia and Ukraine. But it is possible that . . . stories were manipulated from abroad,” he said.

Back in March the acting Director-General of the SIS told Parliament: “States are trying, in a coercive disruptive and a covert way, to influence the behaviors of people in New Zealand and influencing their decision making”.

John Mackey named no nations at the time, but his GCSB counterpart Andrew Hampton told MPs research had shown Russia was the source of misinformation many Kiwis were consuming.

Is it really likely the Kremlin or its proxies are pushing propaganda into the news here? And if so, to what end?

“I think there’s been a little bit of ‘too florid’ language used about this. This person has inserted what are in some people’s views genuine talking points from those who . . . want to have expressed what the Russian view is. But it was very ham-fisted,” said Bale.

“There are ways to do this. You could have inserted the Russian perspective to highlight the fact that there is a different view about things like the Orange Revolution when the pro-Kremlin leader in Kyiv was overthrown,” he said.

Not necessarily ‘propaganda’
“I don’t think it is necessarily ‘Kremlin propaganda’ as it’s been described. It was just a misguided attempt to bring another perspective, I suspect, but it still represents a tremendous breach of trust,” he said.

“I write a weekly newsletter for The Spinoff about international news, and I try sometimes to show . . . there are other perspectives on these stories. Those things are legitimate to address — but not just surreptitiously squeeze into a story in some sort of perceived balance.

“I don’t think in this particular case that it is to do with the spread of disinformation or misinformation by Russia. I think this is a different set of problems. But I agree (there’s a) threat from the kind of chaos-driving techniques that Russia is particularly brilliant at. They’re very skilled at twisting stories . . . and I think we need to be ready for it,” he said.

The guest speaker at that Koi Tū event last Wednesday was Dr Joan Donovan, the research director of the Shorenstein center on Media and Politics at Harvard University in the US, where she researches and tracks the sources of misrepresentation and misinformation in the media, and the impact they have on public trust in media — and also how media can prepare for it.

At the point where 15 supplied news stories had been found to be “inappropriately edited” by RNZ, she took to Twitter to say: “This is wild. Fake news has reached new heights.”

Set against what we’ve seen in US politics — and about Russia and Ukraine — is it really that bad?

“Usually what you see is the spoofing of a website or a URL in order to look like you’re a certain outlet and distribute disinformation that way. It’s very unlikely that someone would go in and work a job and be editing articles without proper oversight,” said Donovan  — who is also the co-author of recently published book, Meme Wars, The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy. 

“I think when it comes to one country, wanting to insert their views into another country — even though New Zealand is very small — it does track that this would be a way to influence a large group of people.

“But I don’t think if any of us know the degree to which this could be an international operation or not,” she told Mediawatch.

“What you learn is that their pattern is that they happen over and over and over again until a news agency or platform company figures out a mitigation tactic, whether it’s removing that link from search or writing critical press or debunking those stories.

“When I think about the fallout of it . . . using the legitimacy of RNZ in a parasitical kind of way and that legitimacy to spread propaganda is one of the most important pieces of this puzzle that we would need to explore more,” she said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The RNZ board is meeting tonight to begin setting up an independent review on how pro-Russian sentiment was inserted into a number of its online stories.

An RNZ digital journalist has been placed on leave after it came to light he had changed copy from news agency Reuters on the war in Ukraine to include pro-Russian views.

Since Friday, hundreds of stories published by RNZ have been audited, and 16 Reuters stories and one BBC item had to be corrected, with chief executive Paul Thompson saying more would be checked “with a fine-tooth comb”.

The journalist told RNZ’s Checkpoint he had subbed stories that way for a number of years and nobody had queried it. Thompson said those comments appeared to be about the staffer’s overall role as a sub-editor.

Board chairperson Dr Jim Mather said the public’s trust had been eroded by revelations and it was going to take a lot of work to come back from what had happened.

“We see ourselves as guardians of a taonga and that taonga being the 98 years of history that RNZ has in terms of trusted public media and high standards of excellent journalism and so it is fair to say we are extremely disappointed,” he told RNZ’s Checkpoint on Monday.

“We need to demonstrate that we are prepared to review every aspect of what has occurred to actually start the restoration process in terms of confidence in RNZ.”

The board would discuss who will run the investigation and its terms of reference, and would make a decision “very soon”.

Currency is trust
“The role the board is going to take is we are going to appoint the panel of trusted individuals, experienced journalists, those that do have editorial experience to undertake the review. This is going to be done completely separate from the other work being undertaken by management,” he said.

Dr Mather said the currency of the public broadcaster was trust, and the revelations had impacted the organisation’s journalists.

“I know that we pride ourselves as having the highest standards of journalistic quality so I can just say that it’s had a significant impact also on our journalism team.”

Reuters said it had “addressed the issue” with RNZ, noting in a statement that RNZ had initiated an investigation.

“As stated in our terms and conditions, Reuters content cannot be altered without prior written consent,” the spokesperson’s statement said.

“Reuters is fully committed to covering the war in Ukraine impartially and accurately, in keeping with the Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.”

‘Important that politicians don’t interfere’ – Hipkins
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said while he would never rule out a cross-party parliamentary inquiry, he had not seen anything so far to suggest the need for an wider action.

Hipkins told RNZ’s Morning Report he was not sure a cross-party parliamentary inquiry on issues around editorial decisions would be a good way of protecting the editorial independence of an institution like RNZ.

“Having said that, we always monitor these kinds of things to see how they are being handled, it’s really important that politicians don’t interfere in that,” he said.

“I think if it reached a point where public confidence in the institution was so badly tarnished that some degree of independent review was required, I’d never take that off the table.”

But in the first instance, it was important to allow RNZ’s management and board to deal with it with the processes that they had in place, Hipkins said.

“I haven’t seen anything in the last few days that would suggest that there’s any case for us to trigger something that’s more significant than what’s being done at the moment.”

Hipkins said he had not sought, nor had, any briefings from New Zealand’s security services in relation to the incident because it was a matter of editorial independence and it was important that politicians did not get involved in that.

“RNZ, while it’s a publicly-funded institution, must operate independently of politicians.”

Not an issue for politicians – Willis
National Party deputy leader Nicola Willis agreed that it was not an issue for politicians to be involved in.

She said it was important the investigation was carried out, and the concern was about editorial standards that let the situation go unnoticed for such a long time.

Trust in media was important and people reading mainstream media expected stories to go through a fact-checking process and reflect appropriate editorial independence, she told RNZ’s First Up.

“I think it will be a watch for newsrooms around the country, and I hope that it’s a thorough investigation that comes out with robust recommendations.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

One year to the day since Russian tanks ran over the Ukraine border — and over the UN Charter and international law in the process — the world is less certain and more dangerous than ever.

For New Zealand, the war has also presented a unique foreign policy challenge.

The current generation of political leaders initially responded to the invasion in much the same way previous generations responded to the First and Second World Wars: if a sustainable peace was to be achieved, international treaties and law were the mechanism of choice.

But when it was apparent these higher levels of maintaining international order had gridlocked because of the Russian veto at the UN Security Council, New Zealand moved back towards its traditional security relationships.

Like other Western alliance countries, New Zealand didn’t put boots on the ground, which would have meant becoming active participants in the conflict. But nor did New Zealand plead neutrality.

It has not remained indifferent to the aggression and atrocities, or their implications for a rule-based world.

The issue one year on is whether this original position is still viable. And if not, what are the military, humanitarian, diplomatic and legal challenges now?

President Biden makes a surprise visit to Kyiv in dramatic show of U.S. support for Ukraine days before anniversary of invasion https://t.co/iqUrTrRqvq

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) February 20, 2023

Military spending
While New Zealand has no troops or personnel in Ukraine, it has given direct support.

Defence force personnel assist with training, intelligence, logistics, liaison, and command and administration support. There has also been funding and supplied equipment worth more than NZ$22 million.

This has been welcomed, although it is considerably less on a proportional basis than the assistance offered by other like-minded countries. However, the deeper questions involve how the war has affected defence policies and spending overall internationally.

While New Zealand’s current Defence Policy Review is important at the policy level, the implications affect all citizens and political parties. Specifically, most countries — allies or not — are increasing military spending and collaborating to develop new generations of weapons.

For New Zealand, this calls into question the longer-term feasibility of its relatively low spending of 1.5 percent of GDP on defence. And Wellington is increasingly being left out of collaborative arrangements (AUKUS being just one example), which in turn reinforce alliances and provide pathways to technology.

This is tied to the largest question of all: whether New Zealand wishes to relegate itself to becoming a regional “police officer” or wants to carry its fair share of being part of an interlinked modern military deterrent.

Amid U.S. claims that Beijing may be poised to send weapons to help Russia’s war in Ukraine, China accused the Biden administration of spreading lies and defended Beijing’s close partnership with Russia. https://t.co/52tRnRRAFh

— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 20, 2023

Diplomacy and domestic law
New Zealand also needs to reconsider its commitment to humanitarian assistance. So far, almost $13 million has been spent and a special visa created allowing New Zealand-Ukrainians to bring family members in for two years. With the war showing no sign of ending, this will likely need to extend.

But New Zealand’s non-neutral status also means it has other responsibilities, and should consider greater assistance with the Ukrainian refugee emergency. This would require going beyond the current visa scheme, and opening and expanding the refugee quota programme’s current cap of 1500.

Diplomatically, New Zealand also has to start considering what peace would look like. This raises hard questions about territorial integrity, accountability for war crimes, reparations and what might happen to populations that do not want to be part of Ukraine.

New Zealand has enacted a stand-alone law to apply sanctions on Russia. But because this now sits outside the broken multilateral UN system, a degree of caution is called for, given the door is now open to sanction other countries, UN mandate or not.

Preparing for the worst
Finally, New Zealand needs to prepare for the worst. The war is showing no sign of calming down. Weapons and combatant numbers are escalating unsustainably.

Nuclear arms control is in freefall, with Russian President Vladimir Putin suspending participation in the New START Treaty, the last remaining agreement between Russia and the United States.

At the same time, the US has ramped up the rhetoric, suggesting China might supply arms to Russia, and declaring unequivocally that Russia has committed crimes against humanity in Ukraine.

Were China to go against Western demands and provide weapons, countries like New Zealand will be in a very difficult position: its leading security ally, the US, may expect penalties to be imposed against its leading trade partner, China.

While Putin may be able to live with the rising death toll of his own soldiers (already over 100,000), at some point the Russian population won’t be. As the US discovered in Vietnam, it was not the external enemy that ultimately prevailed, it was domestic unrest, as more people turned against an unpopular war.

How Putin will respond to a war he cannot win conventionally, while risking losing popularity and position at home, is impossible to predict.

Everyone might hope his nuclear threats are a bluff, but New Zealand’s leaders would be wise to plan for the worst.

Whether a small, distant, non-neutral South Pacific nation might be a direct target or not is conjecture. What is not speculation, however, is that if the Ukraine war spins out of control, New Zealand would be in an emergency unlike anything it’s witnessed before.

Dr Alexander Gillespie, professor of law, University of Waikato. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Zelensky began with a friendly “kia ora” before saying he would offer New Zealand the opportunity to take the lead in pushing for peace.

“Today, this anti-war coalition has more than 100 countries, those who support the fundamental principle of international law and the UN Charter,” he said.

“Those who do everything possible to hold Russia’s war criminals accountable.”

He said New Zealand was one of the first countries to support Ukraine against Russia’s aggressive invasion and he recognised New Zealand imposed sanctions.

“Let me offer you one more thing, various dictators and aggressors — they always fail to realise that the strength of the free world is not about someone becoming large or becoming full of missiles but in the fact that everyone knows how to unite and act decisively and make a unique contribution to the common cause.

“Perhaps the time has come for your country to make such a unique contribution.”

President Zelensky’s address to the NZ Parliament today. Video: NZ Parliament TV

Peace plan 10 points
He said this could be one of the 10 points in the plan he laid out at the G19 Summit in Indonesia:

• Radiation and nuclear safety
• Food security
• Energy security
• Release of prisoners and deportees
• Implementation of the UN Charter
• Withdrawal of Russian troops and cessation of hostilities
• Justice
• Ecocide and the protection of the environment
• Prevention of escalation
• Confirmation of the end of the war

“Each of these points can remove one or another of Russia’s aggression … I propose to convene a special summit in the coming months.”

He called upon New Zealand to support this formula and to start consolidating the world around the eighth point, environmental security, saying many people did not consider the impact of war on the environment and it was one aspect New Zealand society approached wisely.

“You can’t rebuild destroyed nature, just as you can’t rebuild destroyed lives.”

“There’s no true peace where the consequences of war could be there in the form of poisoned groundwater that may destroy normal lives in several countries. There’s no true peace where ecocide has taken place and its consequences have not been neutralised.”

He said to this day, the world had no strong experience in overcoming the destructive impact of war on the environment.

‘We will win’
“We will liberate our land. We will win this war. I am confident that we will return freedom and security to all Ukrainians wherever they live.”

“Ngā mihi, Slava Ukraini (glory to Ukraine).”

Zelensky is just the second head of a foreign government to address Parliament after Australia’s Julia Gillard in 2011.

The Ukrainian leader’s message to New Zealand comes as the government announced new sanctions on Iranian individuals and an entity involved in the manufacture and supply of drones to Russia.

Those sanctioned today include two Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commanders, the Armed Forces General Staff chair Mohammad Hossein Bagheri and drone manufacturer Shahed Aviation Industries.

He has previously spoken to other parliaments, including in the UK, US, European Union, and Australia, appealing for assistance and support in defending Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.

In September, Zelensky addressed world leaders at the United Nations, demanding a special UN tribunal impose “just punishment” on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, including financial penalties and stripping Moscow of its veto power in the Security Council.

Ardern announces further humanitarian aid
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in response thanked him on behalf of New Zealand and said taking the time to speak today was a sacrifice when he was leading his people through a crisis “and one we do not take lightly”.

She hoped he heard loudly and clearly from New Zealand that Ukraine’s was not a forgotten war, and the Parliament on the other side of the world had come together to condemn Russia’s war.

“Our support for Ukraine was not determined by geography, it was not determined by history or by diplomatic ties or relationships — our judgment was a simple one: we asked ourselves the question ‘what if it was us’.”

She also referred to the breach of the international rules-based order and “the misuse of multilateral institutions”.

Running through New Zealand’s commitments to the Ukrainian war effort, she made a further announcement of $3 million of humanitarian aid to Ukraine, through the International Committee of the Red Cross, as the population faces severe hardships over winter.

This would cover items like medical supplies and equipment, power transformers and generators to cope with blackouts, and essential winter items for vulnerable families in Ukraine, like food, water and sanitation and hygiene items.

Ardern acknowledged the plan laid out by Zelensky today, and said the war “must not become a gateway to a more polarised and dangerous world for generations to come”.

Long-term impacts
She acknowledged Zelensky’s urging to counter the long-term impacts of war including with the environment, saying New Zealand had a long history of reconstruction post-conflict.

“That includes remediation such as dealing with unexploded ordinances. We will be with you as you seek peace but we will also be with you as you rebuild.”

She paid a special tribute to Zelensky himself, saying he had been unrelenting in his support of his people and coordinated an international response in support of the rules-based order.

“Kia kaha, kia māia, kia manawanui – slava Ukraini.”

In a statement, Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta said the new contribution “comes as the Russian military has stepped up its deliberate targeting of critical national infrastructure, further deepening the severe humanitarian crisis caused by the illegal invasion.”

“Russia’s targeting of energy and other civilian infrastructure is deplorable. As Ukraine faces a harsh winter, Putin’s actions have further disrupted electricity supply, and are harming the health, safety and well-being of already vulnerable communities,” the statement said.

The aid is in addition to almost $8m in humanitarian help already provided, and $48m of military spending including on training deployments, donation of surplus equipment, and procurement of weapons and ammunition.

Other party leaders speak
Opposition National Party leader Christopher Luxon said it was a great honour and tremendous privilege for the Parliament to hear Zelensky’s address, “and we all appreciate the opportunity to say to you ‘kia kaha’, which in our indigenous Māori language means ‘stay strong’.”

He said for those nations that valued democracy, national sovereignty and borders, and uphold the international rule of law the choice was simple.

“New Zealand is one of those countries. Confronted with brutality or diplomacy, autocracy or democracy, darkness or light, there was nothing to discuss except how to individually and collectively to support Ukraine.”

He said the war was a moral battle that posed an existential threat to Ukraine and it could not lose.

“You have been our generation’s Winston Churchill, and since those Russian tanks crossed Ukraine’s border, you have been unwavering in your determination that Ukraine will win this war that it did not want and it did not start.

“Of all the miscalculations Vladimir Putin has made — and there are many — underestimating your resolve and the impact of the strength of your leadership and the words — your words — would have in rallying Ukraine and the world has perhaps been the biggest.”

He said the death of every single Ukrainian was a tragedy, and the greatest regret of the war would be terrible loss of life that left tens of thousands of families bereft.

Luxon also spoke of the need for a reconstruction programme, because “the loss of homes and communities and critical infrastructure is also incalculable”. He said he could not imagine circumstances where New Zealand was not a part of that effort.

Green Party co-leader James Shaw said Russia’s invasion was “as barbaric as it is illegal”.

“It is apparent that there have been and continues to be a multitude of war crimes perpetuated on the Ukrainian people by the Russian forces.

“Were President Putin to be successful, the temporary violence of war would morph into the permanent violence of subjugation — perhaps even genocide.”

He said he applauded the Ukrainians’ efforts to minimise harm to civilians, however he urged that any future calls for military support come before the Parliament — not just the government.

“As a member of the Green Party I have a fundamental commitment to non-violence … the situation in Ukraine remains impossibly difficult in ways that we in Aotearoa New Zealand cannot possibly imagine.”

He said there were people on every continent still suffering from violence and subjugation, and emphasised the importance of universal human rights.

ACT leader David Seymour said he wanted Zelensky and the Ukrainian people “to know that on the other side of the world people care deeply about your struggle against evil”.

“We understand that a dictator attacking our democracy matters to New Zealand, your people are not just fighting for their lives but for all our freedom and democracy and I want you to know that your leadership and courage inspires us.”

He spoke of the New Zealanders who had gone to fight in Ukraine on their own initiative, and the funds raised for the defenders.

“Our donors were particularly pleased to buy luggage tags made from bits of aluminium from downed Russian jets – what great initiative under fire.”

But his comments also took a more political turn, saying the opposition had pushed for the government to do more.

“More sanctions, more refugee places, more lethal aid, and we’ll keep pushing them from this side of our Parliament and if our government changes before you win the New Zealand government will do a lot more than the $3 million you saw today.

“For now, please let me say that you are right and you are fighting against evil for all our freedom, and we back you not only in word but in deed. Slava Ukraini.”

Te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer said they supported the kōrero of the Green Party.

“We have little to say today, all the teachings have been learnt of former occasions of war,” she said, quoting Te Whiti-o-Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi, the prophets from Taranaki.

“We have been living together quietly, there will be nothing but mate — but death — for generations to come. We are small in numbers but we are strong. We are fighting not for part of peace but for the whole of peace.

“We today have one role, one role only, and that is to fight for peace.”

She said that as at Parihaka, Te Pāti Māori would continue to fight to uphold peace and make sure there was no suffering the young and coming generations could be ashamed of.

She and fellow co-leader Rawiri Waititi, along with other MPs around the House, concluded with a waiata written in World War II.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A View from Afar – In this podcast, political scientist Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will analyse the advent of new technologies and the rise of hybrid warfare.

In this episode, we will take you on a journey into a world that exists all around us, no matter where we live. But, it’s fair to say, it’s a world few realise exists and few realise how it is effecting them.

With the technologies that surround us, tech that we use every day, it has become easy to conduct indirect or non-attributable warfare using a variety of means.

There’s the grey area phenomena where opponent states undermine adversaries from within, sowing distrust, or fear, where there should not be. The purpose is to weaken public trust and a population’s resolve to support their government.

In an extreme situation, this form of hostilities can escalate into hybrid warfare using indirect and direct means, from cyber offensives to firepower.

To illustrate the issue, we will draw on the build-up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and also evaluate other locations around the world where there is evidence of hybrid warfare.

It may surprise you to realise how close to home are real world examples of hybrid warfare.

Join Paul and Selwyn for this LIVE recording of this podcast while they consider these big issues, and remember any comments you make while live can be included in this programme.

You can comment on this debate by clicking on one of these social media channels and interacting in the social media’s comment area. Here are the links:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here.

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

There is more than one useful perspective on the present Russian war in Ukraine. None of these put the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin’s Russian war machine in anything other than an egregious light; Mr Putin is a geopolitical warrior of the worst order. He believes that he is waging a war against the treasonous secession of a territory that, in the view of him and many other Russians, should be an integral part of a Russian/Slavic ethno-political union.

(It is important to note that the western coalition of countries has a very different view. In the western view, the Soviet Union was dissolved, giving birth to fifteen sovereign, unaligned and autonomous nation states. The objective reality for almost all countries is of course some point in between full independence and some subjection to a higher or bigger authority.)

Putin’s badness does not however make good all those who would wage rhetorical or physical war against Russia. Further, most of history is scripted by the winners of conflicts. And as time passes, particular agendas come to the fore, reflecting ephemeral cultural concerns which inevitably influence different generations of historians.

One of today’s most prevalent cultural concerns is racism, and rightly so. A result, though, is that historical events come to be seen almost entirely through an ahistorical lens; in the case of 2020, the liberal anti-racism lens. Thus World War Two (WW2), more than ever, is understood as a fascist racist genocide against Jews; and that ‘the liberal west’ were fighting tooth and nail against the racist fascist Nazis because they were racist and fascist. Likewise, the United States’ Civil War of 1861-1865 is understood by many as a simple battle of good versus evil, black versus white; an anti-racist North fighting to the death against the racist slavers in the South, in order to free the ethnically African slaves.

In reality, both of these tumultuous conflicts were principally about something else; though the ‘bad guys’ were infused with self-serving views of racial superiority. War crimes were committed aplenty by all sides in these conflicts. In WW2, the principal motivation of the German aggressors – under the sway of both the Nazi government and substantial grievances carried over from WW1 – was ‘lebensraum‘, a desire to expand the greater German nation into the ‘Slavic’ territories to Germany’s east, including an expansion into Ukraine’s wheatlands and Russia’s oilfields beyond. Thus the central component of Nazi racism was the convenient belief that Slavs were an inferior people; a natural labouring caste. In the West, we continue to be unaware – through convenient ignorance – that WW2 (and WW1 for that matter) were principally struggles between Teutons and Slavs. (With the proviso that WW2 was also made up of another war of Japanese imperialism, in which Japan’s elite had also granted itself a conviction of ‘far-eastern’ racial superiority.)

The Jews on the other hand were not presented as racial inferiors; rather, they were presented by German nationalists – and by just about all other ethnically-European peoples including the Slavs – as a ‘devious but clever’ ethnic/religious people. The Jews were the ever-present scapegoat ‘race’ who have inherited that role for much of the history of Christianity. Many of the worst pogroms against Jews took place around the time of the Black Death in the fourteenth century; Jews were accused of poisoning the water-wells as a means to genocide, and suffered brutal backlashes as a result of those easily disprovable claims. In the fifty years from 1875 to 1925, the worst anti-Jewish pogroms took place in the western parts of ‘greater Russia’, including the early Soviet Union. And they continued in the Baltic States and Ukraine before the Germans arrived. The West – including the English-speaking West – was generally unsympathetic; many liberal westerners believed in the anti-Jewish conspiracy theories and, on that point at least, had some empathy towards the German Nazis.

Wars of Secession

The conflict that I will most focus on is that of the American ‘Civil War’. But we should note that secessions from de jure or de facto political unions are angst-ridden and usually violent affairs. Working backwards, Brexit was certainly angst-ridden, though was fortunately achieved without warfare. Other recent secession states also substantially avoided bloodshed: Slovakia and Slovenia, for example. And the three ex-Soviet Baltic States did manage to shift into both Nato and the European Union, again without bloodshed. Other secessions from ex-Soviet states did take place, militarily though successfully. The attempted secession of Chechnya from Russia was an unsuccessful and bloody affair.

Outside of the former Soviet Union, the secessions from the former Yugoslavia of Bosnia and Kosovo were bloody, and are still incomplete. The attempted secession of Catalonia from Spain failed. The secession from Sudan of South Sudan was a bloody success, though the new country continues to have many problems including tribal division.

Eritrea seceded from Ethiopia in 1991, after a long war of independence. Sadly, Eritrea continued to be entangled with wars in Ethiopia. And it descended into becoming what might best be described as the ‘Stalinist’ state which it is today. Eritrea voted with Syria and Belarus in the UN General Assembly in support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In the mid-2010s, Eritrea – per capita – was a very significant source Mediterranean ‘boat people’ refugees.

In the 1970s, the secession of Bangladesh from Pakistan was a successful though bloody affair. The attempted secession of Biafra from Nigeria was a bloody failure. Much more recently, the long Sr Lankan Civil War – a failed secession attempt by northern Tamils – ended in a bloodbath. The successful secession of Algeria from France in the 1960s was also a very bloody affair.

In the Caribbean, a number of countries seceded from their quasi-American de facto colonial realities: especially Cuba and Nicaragua. Two other attempted secessions were put down militarily through United States ‘gunboat diplomacy’; Grenada in the 1980s and the Dominican Republic in the 1960s. Across the Pacific, Philippines suffered similarly in 1900.

In the late 1910s and early 1920s, Ireland seceded from the United Kingdom, a secession which included a rebellion and a civil war. Similar events occurred in Finland around the same time, as that country seceded from Russia. (Finland, by the way, could have been the model for Ukraine, in the early 2020s. An opportunity tragically squandered.)

A final country worth mentioning is Haiti, which successfully though bloodily (and with the help of an epidemic disease, yellow fever) seceded from France 220 years ago. Haiti’s secession was an uprising of plantation slaves; of Africans, transplanted into the ‘new world’, creating a neo-Africa which (like Eritrea) has been unable to live up to the aspirations of its founders. In all parts of the world, the road to post-secession success is commonly riddled with disappointments.

The US Civil War: The Confederate Secession

In 1860 the ‘Union’ of the United States of America was made up of 33 semi-autonomous states, divided informally into southern and eastern ‘slave states’ and northern and western ‘free states’. Seven of the former states seceded from the Union as the ‘Confederacy’ in February 1861, just weeks before the inauguration of newly elected president Abraham Lincoln. Hostilities began in April with the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, a major Union military site now in Confederate territory.

Thus, Lincoln’s hand was somewhat forced in the direction of suppressing the secession. But it’s unlikely that Lincoln could have tolerated the secession for long, even had the Fort Sumter attack not taken place. After Lincoln called for troops to put down the secession, four more slave states joined the confederacy, including Virginia, adjacent to Washington DC. Washington itself was surrounded by slave states, with Maryland and Delaware – slave states to the north of the federal capital – showing divided loyalties.

By 1860, before the Civil War, the two-party political divide had become established, with the Democratic Party (founded by Thomas Jefferson) prevailing in the slave states, and Lincoln’s Republican Party prevailing in the free states. Lincoln’s predecessor, James Buchanan, had been a Democratic president.

The Civil War that followed lasted for four years and cost more lives in the United States than all other wars (before and after) combined. Latest estimates give an overall death toll of 750,000 in a country of just over 30 million people. The accepted number of civilian deaths is 50,000; although it was almost certainly higher. The demographic technique used to raise the death toll to 750,000 from 620,000 was based on comparisons between the 1860 and 1870 censuses, and focussed only on additional male deaths (using females as a control).

The Civil War was pursued by Lincoln as a war against secession, not a war against slavery; although of course the ‘right’ to maintain slaves was at the core of the secessionary movement. We should not presume that this was a war of northern anti-racists versus southern racists. Indeed the problem of ideological racism in the imperialist west was really only getting started in the 1860s, as the ideas of Social Darwinism took hold. Racism was becoming endemic throughout the western world; and, as well, it should be understood that tribalist and sectarian forms of racism were pretty much endemic in the non-western world.

Slavery was understood in 1860 as essentially a labour issue, rather than as a race issue. The division between north and south reflected divergent economic development, with the south taking a liberal free trade position (seeing its future in agrarian terms), whereas the north was pursuing a protectionist model of economic development through industrialisation and its need to stablish a strong domestic market for locally produced manufactured goods.

The Civil War became a particularly nasty war, fought mostly on Confederate territory, which became for a long time a military stalemate. From a Confederate point of view, this was a war of defence; defence of their territory from the destruction and depredation being inflicted by an invading force, a force superior in numbers but inferior in passion.

The Confederates miscalculated, in the sense that they hoped for much more support – including direct military support – from the United Kingdom and possibly France; the United Kingdom in particular was committed to the liberal free trade cost-competitive model of economic development. Nevertheless, the Confederate armies put up an amazing fight.

What were the counterfactuals? If Lincoln had withdrawn after Fort Sumter, and accepted the secession of the original seven states, then the savagery could have been avoided, and the slave issue would have been eventually resolved, probably as it was resolved in Brazil in the 1880s. But a display of apparent weakness on Lincoln’s part might have encouraged the remaining eight slave states to join the secession, leaving Washington DC – the Union capital – as a geographical enclave. And such apparent weakness could easily have led to further secessions in the mid-west and far-west. Had the secession succeeded, the USA today might have just been Pennsylvania, New York and New England.

An import part of the Civil War, and its brutality, was the ‘scorched earth’ deployment of Union troops through Georgia in 1864 – General Sherman’s ‘March to the Sea’. Many wars of attrition have since followed that model of wanton destruction of land and people. The Georgia campaign may have been, literally, overkill. Could Lincoln have suppressed the secession with a lesser level of destruction?

What if Lincoln’s troops had lost the war? Today he would be zero rather than hero; known as a maker of widows. Perhaps a war criminal in light of the Georgia campaign? Washington would have become capital of a US Confederate state which would have gained international recognition soon enough; and slaves would have been freed eventually, decades later. Once matters get taken so far, there is no going back; there’s only victory or ignominy. Abraham Lincoln, like Julius Caesar, crossed his Rubicon.

Epilogue: The Great American Political Realignment

The origins of the Democratic Party lie in the southern plantations and in Thomas Jefferson’s agrarian dream of white liberal yeoman autonomy. The Republican Party – and its forerunner, the Federalist Party – began with Alexander Hamilton’s commitment to industrialisation and grew with the subsequent development of big business in the northern states. Jefferson was a libertarian slave-owning patrician. The more conservative Hamilton was of humbler origins, born in the British West Indies as the result of an ex-nuptial union; rumours that his mother was of ‘mixed race’ have not been substantiated. (Certainly, Jefferson had children of mixed race.) Hamilton would almost certainly have become an early American president; that is, had he not been killed in a duel.

A quick purview of the 1920 presidential election results shows a substantial win to the Republican Party. The alignment of red (Republican) and blue (Democrat) states very much reflected the conflicting origins of the two parties. The 2004 election, again a Republican victory, shows a near complete geographical switch. All the blue states in 1920 were red in 2004. And all the blue states in 2004 were red in 1920. The geographic switch largely happened in the 1970s and 1980s, though Bill Clinton being a southerner raised the Democrat vote in the 1990s in the south to higher levels than might otherwise have occurred.

Yet the Democrats continue to be the party of liberalism (although some aspects of the meaning of ‘liberalism’ in America have changed), and the Republicans continue to be the party of conservatism. As the party of liberalism, the Democrats have always been the party of internationalism, hence the greater and ongoing propensity of the Democrats to participate – or at least align – in international conflicts. Historically the more nationalist Republicans have taken a more neutral stance than the Democrats with respect to conflicts in Europe and Asia, preferring not to get involved.

The American Civil War was, in part, a desire on the part of the South to remain internationally connected; to sell cotton and tobacco to Europe, and to buy goods – and labourers – on the world market. The South paid a very high price in its quest to maintain its version of the good life. The North won a great victory, and then freed the slaves; Abraham Lincoln won his venerated place in history.

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

If you’re as confused as most people by the exact circumstances surrounding the continuing presence in Fiji of the Russian super yacht Amadea, join the club. Here’s our modest attempt to cut through the fog.

Twelve days ago — on April 14 — the CJ Patel Fiji Sun newspaper trumpeted an exclusive with Police Commissioner Sitiveni Qilihio, reporting that the Amadea had been seized. It had not. In fact, it still hasn’t been formally seized.

What happened last week is that the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) obtained a restraining order from the High Court to prevent the Amadea from leaving Fiji. Until that order was granted, there was every possibility in the intervening period of the vessel leaving.

In fact, lawyers for the owners were arguing that there was no legal justification to detain the Amadea any longer after they had reportedly paid an amount in fines for customs infringements.

It was only when the High Court granted the restraining order that leaving was no longer a legal option.

Indeed, all along there has been a suspicion that the vessel might try to make a run for it. It has a significant armoury and the security forces would have already factored in their ability to prevent a determined attempt to leave.

This application was lodged by the Office of the DPP on a warrant issued by the United States government. The papers are from Washington DC and passed through the Attorney-General’s Office before carriage of the matter was given to the DPP under the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act.

A second case
Now there is a second case that has been brought before the High Court for the Amadea to be seized. Yes, taken from the owners altogether in line with the American-led sanctions that have been imposed on the nautical playthings and other toys of Russian oligarchs and Vladimir Putin’s cronies the world over.

The High Court will hand down its judgment next Tuesday (May 3), which is expected to be in Washington’s favour.

And sometime after that, the Amadea will presumably become the property of the US government and sail off into the sunset under the command of Uncle Sam in the direction of the US.

It has been an astonishing saga. The original, mostly European crew, had orders to sail from the Mexican port of Mazanillo across the entire Pacific to the Russian port of Vladivosok via Lautoka, where the Amadea has been refuelled and resupplied.

Their services have evidently been terminated and an entirely Russian crew has been on standby to take over when it finally gets permission to sail. Alas for them, their journey to Fiji will have been in vain.

Incredibly, there is still doubt about the vessel’s true ownership. The whole world has been told that it belongs to the Russian oligarch, Suleiman Kerimov, but there is still evidently no conclusive proof — the vessel’s ownership evidently buried in a labyrinth of multiple shelf companies in places like the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands.

For the purposes of the High Court case in Suva, the owner is officially stated as being Millemarin Investment Limited. Is it Suleiman Kerimov?

No evidence about Kerimov
Millemarin Investment’s local lawyer, Feizal Hannif, told the court there was no evidence that it is. He said the vessel’s beneficial owner was in fact one Eduard Khudaynatov. But counsel for the DPP, Jayneeta Prasad, argued that the ownership of the vessel was not an issue. It was subject to a US warrant and the ownership issue was for the American courts to decide.

So fortunately unravelling all of this is not Fiji’s problem. But what was Police Commissioner Sitiveni Qiliho doing 12 days ago telling the Fiji Sun that the Amadea had been seized when we won’t know that for certain until next Tuesday, nearly three weeks after the Sun “scoop”?

And is there going to be any attempt to set the official record straight?

Australian-Fijian journalist Graham Davis publishes the blog Grubsheet Feejee on Fiji affairs. Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The High Court in Suva has allowed an application by the public prosecutor to stop the super yacht Amadea belonging to Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov from leaving its waters.

Kerimov, who was not on board, is facing sanctions from the United States, Britain and the European Union over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Fiji’s Director of Public Prosecutions Christopher Pryde filed the application on Tuesday — a week after the yacht moored at the Lautoka Wharf without customs clearance.

Pryde confirmed that the US was seeking to seize the vessel.

In his application, he requested that: “Amadea be restrained from leaving Fijian waters until the finalisation of an application to register a warrant to seize the property and that a US warrant to seize the Amadea be registered.”

The court is yet to hear the application.

FBC News reports says a second application for the US to seize the yacht will be heard today.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Fiji Revenue and Customs Service has issued two infringement notices to the captain of the seized Russian super yacht Amadea which is berthed in Lautoka port.

These are notices under Section 14 of the Customs Act of 1986 for failure to comply with procedure on arrival and Section 17 which deals with failure to comply with people disembarking.

Section 14 deals with infringements under “procedure on arrival” where the master of every aircraft or ship arriving in the Fiji Islands shall bring the ship or aircraft to an airport or port or mooring without touching at any other place.

A fine not exceeding F$20,000 (NZ$14,000) or imprisonment for four years applies for the infringement.

Section 17 deals with “provisions as to persons disembarking from or going onboard an aircraft, ship” and states a person who contravenes or fails to comply with any direction given by the Customs comptroller under the provisions of this section is guilty of an offence and is liable to a fine not exceeding F$10,000 (NZ$7000).

“These charges are as per the Customs Act 1986,” said Police Commissioner Brigadier-General Sitiveni Qiliho.

“Normally the Act, (FRCS) Fiji Revenue and Customs Service acts on a fine matrix. If he pays the fines, then good otherwise, we will need to go to the court.”

US officials join investigation
Repeka Nasiko reports that American government officials are working with the Fiji Police Force in investigations over the Amadea.

Police Commissioner Brigadier-General Sitiveni Qiliho said the US investigators had already boarded the super yacht.

Commissioner Qiliho said investigations were progressing well.

“We are working very closely with the US government in regard to the current seizure of the yacht at the moment while we go through that investigation process,” he said.

He said the next course of action would not take place overnight and “probably take the next couple of days”.

The crew, he said, were on board and the person of interest was the captain of the vessel.

“The crew are of other nationalities.

“Their embassies and high commissions have been in touch with the investigation team and we are working through the US government with those embassies regarding the crew members who continue to be on board the vessel.”

He added that all relevant defence and border agencies were involved in the investigations.

“We have the RFMF through the Fiji Navy, Customs, Fiji Police and our international counterparts that monitor the movement of vessels.”

Amadea is reportedly owned by Russian oligarch Suleiman Kerimov, who is currently sanctioned by foreign governments, including the US, over the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Anish Chand is the Fiji Times West Bureau chief reporter; Repeka Nasiko is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

“We don’t do Russians.” This was the response from Fiji’s Health Minister Dr Ifereimi Waqainabete when asked about the arrival on Tuesday of Russian super yacht Amadea.

“We’ll need clarification on that then we can comment on that,” he said. “We don’t do Russians.”

While the Prime Minister’s office did not respond to queries on the subject, the United States Embassy in Suva and the Delegation of the European Union in the Pacific said they had been in contact with the Fiji government over the presence in Fiji of the super yacht.

The Amadea, which arrived on Tuesday and was still in port yesterday, is owned by Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov.

Kerimov is on the United States, British and European Union sanctions list that came out after Russia’s invasion on Ukraine. Yachts owned by other sanctioned individuals have been seized all over the world.

“Seizing assets of Russian oligarchs supporting the invasion of Ukraine is a part of the sanction regime applied by the European Union,” said Sujiro Seam, Ambassador of the Delegation of the European Union.

“Several Russian oligarchs’ yachts have already been impounded in the European Union. The European Union is cooperating with partners around the world on the matter, including in the Pacific.

Consulting with Fiji
“The European Union is aware of reports of the presence of Amadea in Lautoka and, together with like-minded partners, is consulting with the government of Fiji.”

The US Embassy in Fiji also issued a similar statement, saying they are “cooperating with Fijian authorities on the matter”.

“The United States is committed to finding and seizing the assets of the oligarchs who have supported the Russian Federation’s brutal, unprovoked war of choice against Ukraine,” Stephanie Fitzmaurice, the regional public affairs officer said.

We are working closely with governments and private sector partners in Europe, and the entire world, including Fiji, on this issue.”

According to Fijian entry requirements, yachts must seek approval from the Ministry of Health, Ministry of Trade and Tourism and the Immigration Department before departing their last port.

Anish Chand is the Fiji Times West Bureau chief reporter. Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A View from Afar – In this podcast, political scientist Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning discuss how numerous countries have committed aid, intelligence expertise, military hardware and weapons to a multilateral effort in support of Ukraine.

What does this 2022-style of military diplomacy mean for the independent foreign policies of countries like New Zealand – with its style of incremental contributions in aid of the defence of Ukraine?

For example, the New Zealand Government this week confirmed the deployment of a C-130 Hercules with 50 personnel to Europe; a further eight logistics specialists based in Germany; $13 million in further support to procure equipment for the Ukraine military.

On announcing the move, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said: “Our support is to assist the Ukraine Army to repel a brutal Russian invasion because peace in the region of Europe is essential for global stability.”

Ardern added: “The global response has seen an unprecedented amount of military support pledged for Ukraine, and more help to transport and distribute it is urgently needed, and so we will do our bit to help.” (ref. ForeignAffairs.co.nz, https://foreignaffairs.co.nz/2022/04/11/mil-osi-new-zealand-new-zealand-sends-c130-hercules-and-50-strong-team-to-europe-to-support-ukraine/ )

So today, we examine how Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with its method of total annihilation, has drawn once relatively independent nations into the fold of western security alliances. And we will consider whether such moves will become a permanent configuration?

Also in this episode, we will discuss the South-West Pacific strategic balance. Specifically, why has the People’s Republic of China, and the Solomon Islands bilateral security agreement, upset Australia, New Zealand, and the United States of America?

You can comment on this debate by clicking on one of these social media channels and interacting in the social media’s comment area. Here are the links:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here.

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Commander of Joint Forces Jim Gilmour says he is confident New Zealand’s Hercules fleet will be up to the task as 50 Defence Force personnel deploy to Europe.

New Zealand is sending 50 defence force personnel to Europe tomorrow to help distribute donated military aid for Ukraine.

A Hercules aircraft carrying intelligence personnel, logistics is set to depart New Zealand on Wednesday.

This is being described as the country’s biggest military deployment to the region since the early 1990s.

Commander Joint Forces Rear Admiral Jim Gilmour told RNZ Morning Report the deployment presented a low level threat to New Zealand’s people.

He said an advance party which had been sent to the UK would convene with the latest deployment in Stuttgart, Germany — where the international effort is being coordinated.

Admiral Gilmour said the group would spend the week assessing the situation before hopefully travelling across Europe towards Ukraine early next week.

‘None entering Ukraine’
“None of our people will be entering Ukraine, we’ll be moving capabilities to wherever they’re required provided that it is safe for us to do so,” he said.

Admiral Gilmour expected military aid would be delivered via main supply routes into Western Ukraine.

He said although the military’s Hercules aircraft fleet is ageing, the bulk of the 50 military personnel travelling to Europe will be dedicated to supporting the aircraft.

“We’ve become used to being able to maintain them afar and we’ll just deal with problems if the aircraft gives us any … we always have our fingers crossed a little bit but I think I’m confident we’ll be able to start providing support there next week.”

He said military aircraft would remain available in New Zealand to respond to potential crises in the Pacific.

Last week, former Defence Minister Ron Marks suggested New Zealand should send military LAVs (Light Armoured Vehicles) to bolster Ukraine’s efforts in the war — a similar move to Australia’s delivery of Bushmaster vehicles.

Admiral Gilmour said LAVs and other military resources were considered among a suite of response options provided to Cabinet.

“We provide options all the way from fairly light or low options in terms of personnel, advice or remote intelligence for example, all the way through to fairly extensive capabilities including our people.

“We don’t expect that government will take those but our job is to make sure our advice is comprehensive and within that we have a suite of material options we could provide.”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has previously suggested the military’s low stock of sought after weapons, such as Javelin surface-to-air missiles, meant any contribution would make little difference to Ukraine’s efforts.

However, Admiral Gilmour said all decisions on military spending were up to the government but admitted it made logistical sense to release funding to allow the purchase of Javelin missiles closer to the conflict in Ukraine.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says expelling the Russian ambassador remains an option, but it would not have the most impact of the actions New Zealand can take to condemn the Russian invasion.

MPs are debating whether they can summons Ambassador Georgii Zuev for questioning, after he has twice rebuffed their requests to discuss the war in Ukraine.

Ardern told RNZ Morning Report that it is a current discussion by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee and it would be “very unusual” for her to interfere in it.

Ardern said when it is deliberating, the committee is likely to keep in mind the fact that the first time they summonsed the Russian ambassador the request was rejected and the second time it was ignored.

New Zealand has not expelled the Russian ambassador and Ardern said she believes only one country has done so because there are other measures that have more impact on this conflict.

However, she did not rule out the ambassador being expelled in the future.

She said economic sanctions remain a far more powerful stance.

“When we’ve been engaging with our Ukraine counterparts, the focus for them, very much at the moment on economic sanctions, they can see it as having an impact, they want everyone to continue the pressure.”

Appearing before committee ‘minimum’ – Brownlee
However, National’s foreign affairs spokesperson Gerry Brownlee said appearing before the Foreign Affairs Select Committee was the least Russia’s ambassador could do.

Brownlee said the committee wanted to get the ambassador to appear after the Russian embassy in New Zealand put fake news about what was happening in Ukraine on social media.

“So he’s been asked to come to the committee for that to have a talk about that, that’s the minimum thing that he should do, otherwise what’s the point in having him here?”

Brownlee said there was an ongoing discussion about what happens from this point in terms of his appearing before the committee, but he saw it as a bare minimum.

“What is the point in having the guy in New Zealand if it’s not for us to at least put him on the mat over what we see his government has done, or want to be able to tell him his government is doing, is completely wrong.

“He is Vladimir Putin’s mouthpiece in New Zealand and he is able to sit here, get onto the social media, do all sorts of activities in that social media, pushing that Russian line [that] the rest of the world is making all this up and it’s not nearly as bad as it seems – no one believes that.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz