The United Nations climate conference in Brazil this month finished with an “extremely weak” outcome, according to one Pacific campaigner.

Shiva Gounden, the head of Pacific at Greenpeace Australia Pacific, said the multilateral process is currently being attacked, which is making it hard to reach a meaningful consensus on decisions.

“The credibility of COPs [Conference of Parties] is dropping somewhat but it can be salvaged if there’s a little bit of political will, that is visionary from across the world,” he said.

“The Pacific has showed leadership in this quite a bit in the last few COPs.”

Gounden said the outcomes of this COP and previous ones mean global temperature rise will not be limited to 1.5C — the threshold climate scientists say is needed to ensure a healthy planet.

“There are parties within the system who are attacking the science and the facts that show that we need to really be lot more ambitious than we are.

“If that continues there will be a lot more faith that’s lost by a lot of people across the world, and that can only be salvaged by political will and the unity of people across the world.”

No explicit cutting of fossil fuels
COP30 finished in Belém, Brazil, with an agreement that does not explicitly mention cutting fossil fuels. This is despite more than 80 countries pushing to advance previous commitments to transition away from oil, coal and gas.

“I feel the [outcome] was extremely weak,” Gounden said.

Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN) international policy lead Sindra Sharma said the outcome had not made much progress.

“It feels like just a waste of time to be honest, that we haven’t been able to close the ambition gap in any significant way, when a lot of the two weeks was also spent on reminding us that we are in a really bad place.

“We’re going to overshoot 1.5C and we need to do something about it.”

The meeting did finish a call to a least triple adaptation finance which Sharma said was a good signal.

“But if you look at the language, then it’s actually quite non-committal and weak.”

Based in Türkiye next year
COP31 will take place at the coastal city Antalya, Türkiye, next year and Australia will be president of negotiations in the lead up and at the meeting. It gives Australia significant control over deliberations.

A pre-COP will also be hosted in the Pacific.

Gounden said he hoped the plan would become more clear in the next few months.

“This is a very complicated situation where you’ve got a negotiation president that is actually not a host of the presidency as well as the COP president across the whole year, so all of that stuff still needs to be clear and specified.”

He said three different groupings need to work together to make COP work — Türkiye, Australia and the Pacific.

Sharma said the co-presidency between Australia and Türkiye was unusual.

“There’s going to be a lot of work in terms of the push and pull of how those two presidencies are able to work together.”

Talia’s comments are part of a new report from The Fossil Free Pacific Campaign, which argues Australia is undermining the regional solidarity on climate.

Talia said Australia was a long-time friend of Tuvalu, so it was “heartbreaking to see the Albanese government continue to proactively support the continued expansion of the fossil fuel industry”.

“Australia has dramatically increased the amount of energy it generates from clean, renewable sources. But at the same time, coal mines have been extended and the gas industry has been encouraged to continue polluting up to 2070,” Talia said.

“It’s a decision that is hard to reconcile with the government’s own net zero by 2050 target and is incompatible with a viable future for Tuvalu.”

In September, Australia extended the North West Shelf — one of the world’s biggest gas export projects.

The report said Australia’s climate and energy policies are not consistent with the action needed to secure a 1.5C world. It said Australia now had an obligation to align with the International Court of Justice advisory opinion in July which found states could be held legally responsible for their greenhouse gas emissions.

‘Real game changer’
University of Melbourne’s Dr Elizabeth Hicks, a legal academic who was featured in the report, told RNZ Pacific the advisory opinion was a “real game changer” for Australia’s legal obligations.

“We’ve seen that Australian executive government, both under Liberal and Labor, governments continue to approve new fossil fuel projects and industries receive significant subsidies,” Hicks said.

Australia is the leading donor to Pacific Island countries, making up 43 percent of official development finance.

Hicks said that Australia positioned itself as part of the Pacific family, with the nation giving aid and acting as a security partner.

But equally Australia was responsible for the vast majority of emissions coming from the Pacific and had done little to limit fossil fuel expansion, she said.

Individuals and groups could bring lawsuits against their own countries for failing to comply with the court’s opinion, and states could also return to the International Court of Justice to hold each other to account.

The decision by the world’s top court had opened the possibility for countries to sue each other, sje said.

“This is placing Australia, right now in a very uncertain position. It would not be helpful for Australia’s domestic credibility on climate policy, or regionally in the Pacific context, to have proceedings brought against it.”

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

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Not enough is yet known about the seafloor to decide if deep sea mining can start in the Cook Islands, says an ocean scientist with the government authority in charge of seabed minerals.

The Cook Islands Seabed Minerals Authority (SBMA) returned last week from a 21-day deep-sea research expedition on board the United States exploration vessel EV Nautilus.

The trip was also funded by the United States and supported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The Nautilus in the Cook Islands.             Video: RNZ Pacific

High-resolution imagery and data were collected in a bid to better understand what lives on the seafloor.

SBMA knowledge management officer Dr John Parianos said the findings would guide decisions about seabed mining.

“One day someone will have to make a decision about what to do and it’s clear today we don’t know enough to make a decision,” Parianos said.

On its return, EV Nautilus was confronted by a group of Greenpeace Pacific protest kayakers holding signs that read: “Don’t mine the moana”.

One of the protesters, Louisa Castledine told RNZ Pacific she was conscious both NOAA and Nautilus had a reputation for being “environmentally friendly” but was concerned about research being “weaponised”.

“This research is being used to help enable and guide decision making towards deep-sea mining,” said Castledine, who is the spokesperson for Ocean Ancestors.

“It’s the guise in which this research is being used, and it’s who sent them is the challenge, because who sent them is quite clear on their intent in mining.

In August, the US and the Cook Islands agreed to work closer in the area of seabed minerals to “advance scientific research and the responsible development of seabed mineral resources”.

It came off the back of the Cook Islands signing a five-year agreement with China to cooperate in exploring and researching seabed minerals.

Jocelyn Trainer, a geopolitical analyst with Terra Global Insights, said both countries were interested in the metals to enhance military capabilities but it was not the primary market.

“Volumes are greater for other industries such as the renewable energy sectors and in China there’s huge demand for electric vehicles.”

Trainer said China was ahead of the US in obtaining critical minerals through land mining and mineral processing.

“The US is seeming to choose to start with the supply side of things, get the minerals, and then perhaps work up the knowledge of production and refining.”

Castledine said the region was in the middle of a “geopolitical storm” with the US and China vying for control over deep-sea minerals.

“The USA is building their military might within the Pacific and this is one of those ways in which their reach is moving more into the Pacific and more specifically into Cook Islands waters.”

The Nautilus expedition focused on discovery and the chance to test new deep-sea technology.

Expedition lead Renato Kane said bad weather threatened the mission. However, it cleared up in time to send their ROVs down.

“We’ve had six really successful dives to the sea floor. We’re diving these vehicles down to over 5000 meters depth and the length of these dives were on average, about 30 hours each.

“So we’ve got a lot of high definition video footage for scientific observation on the sea floor.”

Central to the expedition’s success was the testing of a new, ultra-high-resolution camera, the MxD SeaCam, designed for deep-sea research at depths of up to 7000 metres.

The camera combines a compact broadcast camera with custom-built titanium housing to capture 4K images with remarkable clarity.

Dr John Parianos said it was some of the best footage ever recorded several kilometres below the surface.

He said footage would help create the Cook Islands first public catalogue of deep-sea life.

“We’ve benefited from probably the highest resolution images ever taken at these depths in the whole world ever,” he said.

“We need to make a catalogue of the types of life in the Cook Islands seabed so that researchers in the future can reference it. Having such high-quality images means that the catalogue will be even better quality than what exists internationally today.”

Tanga Morris, who was responsible for logging data of both biological and geological discoveries on the expedition, said she was in awe of the various life forms they observed.

“One of the main ones that’s quite dominant down in the deep sea would be deep-sea sponges. We’ve seen them in different species, morphotypes, and sizes, even a whole garden of them.”

Other creatures found were sea stars, anemones, octopi and eels — some of which have possibly never been seen before.

“A few people have asked questions like, ‘have you guys spotted any unidentified species?’ And I think we have come across a few, but then it will take a while to really be sure.

“But if so, what a great milestone it is for us to acknowledge that within our Cook Island waters.”

Dr Antony Vavia, a senior research fellow at Te Puna Vai Marama, the Cook Islands Centre for Research, said the opportunity to go onboard and study deep-sea organisms firsthand was an eye-opening experience.

“Everything that I’ve seen down there has been a bit of a wow for me. [I’m] just amazed at how much life is down there. I was talking to my former supervisor, and he described us as the ‘astronauts of the sea’.”

A notable feature of the EV Nautilus was its 24/7 online livestream.

He said people from around the world tuned in during dives to see the deep-sea discoveries for themselves.

“Being able to show what our ROV — what is ROV, the little Hercules, is seeing in real time, and so having the wholesome thought that we’re not on this exploration journey alone.

“But the fact that we can broadcast it to anyone that is interested and invested in learning more about our deep sea environments is incredibly rewarding, because you feel like you’re pulling in others to be a part of this discovery.”

Dr Vavia who is also a lecturer at Auckland University of Technology, said many schools and university groups had got involved, broadcasting the deep-sea right into their classrooms.

“The opportunities to reach out to schools from a primary school level all the way up to university has been a great opportunity to showcase the science that we’re doing here, and hopefully to inspire younger generations and those that are already in the pursuit of careers in marine science or doing work on board research vessels such as the EV Nautilus.”

The EV Nautilus crew said this element of the voyage helped to answer the public’s questions on what life is found on the seabed.

Crew member and journalist Madison Dapcevich said they hoped their passion inspired future scientists.

“Something that’s really great about Nautilus is we do have this like childlike wonder. We do get really excited about sponges, which most people are not that excited about.

“And then it’s also a great pathway for early career professionals. So we do have an internship and fellowship programme, and those applications are open right now through to the end of the year.”

The teams findings that will form their first public catalogue of deep-sea life will be a foundation for future research and one day, the difficult decisions about what lies beneath.

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

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Forty years ago today, French secret agents bombed the Greenpeace campaign flagship  Rainbow Warrior in an attempt to stop the environmental organisation’s protest against nuclear testing at Moruroa Atoll in Mā’ohi Nui.

People gathered on board Rainbow Warrior III to remember photographer Fernando Pereira, who was killed in the attack, and to honour the legacy of those who stood up to nuclear testing in the Pacific.

The Rainbow Warrior’s final voyage before the bombing was Operation Exodus, a humanitarian mission to the Marshall Islands. There, Greenpeace helped relocate more than 320 residents of Rongelap Atoll, who had been exposed to radiation from US nuclear testing.

The dawn ceremony was hosted by Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei and attended by more than 150 people. Speeches were followed by the laying of a wreath and a moment of silence.

Tui Warmenhoven (Ngāti Porou), the chair of the Greenpeace Aotearoa board, said it was a day to remember for the harm caused by the French state against the people of Mā’ohi Nui.

Warmenhoven worked for 20 years in iwi research and is a grassroots, Ruatoria-based community leader who works to integrate mātauranga Māori with science to address climate change in Te Tai Rāwhiti.

She encouraged Māori to stand united with Greenpeace.

“Ko te mea nui ki a mātou, a Greenpeace Aotearoa, ko te whawhai i ngā mahi tūkino a rātou, te kāwanatanga, ngā rangatōpū, me ngā tāngata whai rawa, e patu ana i a mātou, te iwi Māori, ngā iwi o te ao, me ō mātou mātua, a Ranginui rāua ko Papatūānuku,” e ai ki a Warmenhoven.

A defining moment in Aotearoa’s nuclear-free stand
“The bombing of the Rainbow Warrior was a defining moment for Greenpeace in its willingness to fight for a nuclear-free world,” said Dr Russel Norman, the executive director of Greenpeace Aotearoa.

He noted it was also a defining moment for Aotearoa in the country’s stand against the United States and France, who conducted nuclear tests in the region.

In 1987, the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act officially declared the country a nuclear-free zone.

This move angered the United States, especially due to the ban on nuclear-powered or nuclear-armed ships entering New Zealand ports.

Because the US followed a policy of neither confirming nor denying the presence of nuclear weapons, it saw the ban as breaching the ANZUS Treaty and suspended its security commitments to New Zealand.

The Rainbow Warrior’s final voyage before it was bombed was Operation Exodus, during which the crew helped relocate more than 320 residents of Rongelap Atoll in the Marshall Islands, who had been exposed to radiation from US nuclear testing between 1946 and 1958.

The legacy of Operation Exodus
Between 1946 and 1958, the United States carried out 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands.

For decades, it denied the long-term health impacts, even as cancer rates rose and children were born with severe deformities.

Despite repeated pleas from the people of Rongelap to be evacuated, the US government failed to act until Greenpeace stepped in to help.

“The United States government effectively used them as guinea pigs for nuclear testing and radiation to see what would happen to people, which is obviously outrageous and disgusting,” Dr Norman said.

He said it was important not to see Pacific peoples as victims, as they were powerful campaigners who played a leading role in ending nuclear testing in the region.

Between March and April this year, Rainbow Warrior III returned to the Marshall Islands to conduct independent research into the radiation levels across the islands to see whether it’s safe for the people of Rongelap to return.

What advice do you give to this generation about nuclear issues?
“Kia kotahi ai koutou ki te whai i ngā mahi uaua i mua i a mātou ki te whawhai i a rātou mā, e mahi tūkino ana ki tō mātou ao, ki tō mātou kōkā a Papatūānuku, ki tō mātou taiao,” hei tā Tui Warmenhoven.

A reminder to stay united in the difficult world ahead in the fight against threats to the environment.

Warmenhoven also encouraged Māori to support Greenpeace Aotearoa.

Dr Norman believed the younger generations should be inspired to activism by the bravery of those from the Pacific and Greenpeace who campaigned for a nuclear-free world 40 years ago.

“They were willing to take very significant risks, they sailed their boats into the nuclear test zone to stop those nuclear tests, they were arrested by the French, beaten up by French commandos,” he said.

Republished from Te Ao Māori News with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

On the last voyage of the Rainbow Warrior prior to its sinking by French secret agents in Auckland harbour on 10 July 1985 the ship had evacuated the entire population of 320 from Rongelap in the Marshall Islands.

After conducting dozens of above-ground nuclear explosions, the US government had left the population in conditions that suggested the islanders were being used as guinea pigs to gain knowledge of the effects of radiation.

Cancers, birth defects, and genetic damage ripped through the population; their former fisheries and land are contaminated to this day.

Denied adequate support from the US – they turned to Greenpeace with an SOS: help us leave our ancestral homeland; it is killing our people. The Rainbow Warrior answered the call.

Human lab rats or our brothers and sisters?
Dr Merrill Eisenbud, a physicist in the US Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) famously said in 1956 of the Marshall Islanders:  “While it is true that these people do not live, I might say, the way Westerners do, civilised people, it is nevertheless also true that they are more like us than the mice.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Author David Robie and Little Island Press are about to publish next week a 40th anniversary edition of Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior, a first-hand account of the relocation of the Rongelap people by Greenpeace’s flagship Rainbow Warrior in 1985.

Dr Robie joined what turned out to be the ill-fated voyage of the Rainbow Warrior from Hawai’i across the Pacific, with its first stop in the Marshall Islands and the momentous evacuation of Rongelap Atoll.

After completing the evacuation of the 320 people of Rongelap from their unsafe nuclear test-affected home islands to Mejatto Island in Kwajalein Atoll, the Rainbow Warrior headed south via Kiribati and Vanuatu.

After a stop in New Zealand, it was scheduled to head to the French nuclear testing zone at Moruroa in French Polynesia to protest the then-ongoing atmospheric nuclear tests conducted by France for decades.

But French secret agents attached bombs to the hull of the Rainbow Warrior while it was tied up at a pier in Auckland. The bombs mortally damaged the Warrior and killed Greenpeace photographer Fernando Peirera, preventing the vessel from continuing its Pacific voyage.

The new edition of Eyes of Fire will be launched on July 10 in New Zealand.

“This edition has a small change of title, Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior, and has an extra 30 pages, with a new prologue by former Prime Minister Helen Clark,” Dr Robie said in an email to the Journal.

“The core of the book is similar to earlier editions, but bookended by a lot of new material: Helen’s Prologue, Bunny McDiarmid’s updated Preface and a long Postscript 2025 by me with a lot more photographs, some in colour.”

Dr Robie added: “I hope this edition is doing justice to our humanitarian mission and the Rongelap people that we helped.”

He said the new edition is published by a small publisher that specialises in Pacific Island books, often in Pacific languages, Little Island Press.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Immediately after killing Fernando Pereira and blowing up Greenpeace’s flagship the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland harbour, several of the French agents went on a ski holiday in New Zealand’s South Island to celebrate.

Such was the contempt the French had for the Kiwis and the abilities of our police to pursue them.  How wrong they were.

To mark the 40th anniversary of the French terrorist attack Little Island Press has published a revised and updated edition of Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior, first released in 1986.

A new prologue by former prime minister Helen Clark and a preface by Greenpeace’s Bunny McDiarmid, along with an extensive postscript which bring us up to the present day, underline why the past is not dead; it’s with us right now.

Written by David Robie, editor of Asia Pacific Report, who spent 11 weeks on the final voyage of the Warrior, the book is the most remarkable piece of history I have read this year and one of those rare books that has the power to expand your mind and make your blood boil at the same time. I thought I knew a fair bit about the momentous events surrounding the attack — until I read Eyes of Fire.

Heroes of our age
The book covers the history of Greenpeace action — from fighting the dumping of nuclear and other toxic waste in European waters, the Arctic and the Pacific, voyages to link besieged communities across the oceans, through to their epic struggles to halt whaling and save endangered marine colonies from predators.

The Rainbow Warrior’s very last voyage before the bombing was to evacuate the entire population of Rongelap atoll (about 320 people) in the Marshall Islands who had been exposed to US nuclear radiation for decades.

This article is the first of two in which I will explore themes that the book triggered for me.

Neither secret nor intelligent – the French secret intelligence service

Jean-Luc Kister was the DGSE (Direction-générale de la Sécurité extérieure) agent who placed the two bombs that ripped a massive hole in the hull of the Warrior on 10 July 1985. The ship quickly sank, trapping Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira inside.

Former colonel Kister was a member of a large team of elite agents sent to New Zealand. One had also infiltrated Greenpeace months before, some travelled through the country prior to the attack, drinking, rooting New Zealand women and leaving a trail of breadcrumbs that led all the way to the Palais de l’Élysée where François Mitterrand, Socialist President of France, had personally given the order to bomb the famous peace vessel.

Robie aptly calls the French mission “Blundergate”. The stupidity, howling incompetence and moronic lack of a sound strategic rationale behind the attack were only matched by the mendacity, the imperial hauteur and the racist contempt that lies at the heart of French policy in the Pacific to this very day.

Thinking the Kiwi police would be no match for their élan, their savoir-faire and their panache, some of the killers hit the ski slopes to celebrate “Mission Accompli”. Others fled to Norfolk Island aboard a yacht, the Ouvéa.

Tracked there by the New Zealand police it was only with the assistance of our friends and allies, the Australians, that the agents were able to escape. Within days they sank their yacht at sea during a rendezvous with a French nuclear submarine and were evenually able to return to France for medals and promotions.

Two of the agents, however, were not so lucky. As everyone my age will recall, Dominique Prieur and Alain Mafart, were nabbed after a lightning fast operation by New Zealand police.

With friends and allies like these, who needs enemies?
We should recall that the French were our allies at the time. They decided, however, to stop the Rainbow Warrior from leading a flotilla of ships up to Moruroa Atoll in French Polynesia where yet another round of nuclear tests were scheduled. In other words: they bombed a peace ship to keep testing bombs.

By 1995, France had detonated 193 nuclear bombs in the South Pacific.

David Robie sees the bombing as “a desperate attempt by one of the last colonial powers in the Pacific to hang on to the vestiges of empire by blowing up a peace ship so it could continue despoiling Pacific islands for the sake of an independent nuclear force”.

The US, UK and Australia cold-shouldered New Zealand through this period and uttered not a word of condemnation against the French. Within two years we were frog-marched out of the ANZUS alliance with Australia and the US because of our ground-breaking nuclear-free legislation.

It was a blessing and the dawn of a period in which New Zealanders had an intense sense of national pride — a far cry from today when New Zealand politicians are being referred to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague for war crimes associated with the Gaza genocide.

The French State invented the term ‘terrorism’
I studied French History at university in France and did a paper called “La France à la veille de révolution” (France on the eve of revolution). One of the chilling cultural memories is of the period from September 1793 to July 1794, which was known as La Terreur.

At the time the French state literally coined the term “terrorisme” — with the blade of the guillotine dropping on neck after neck as the state tried to consolidate power through terror. But, as Robie points out, quoting law professor Roger S. Clark, we tend to use the term today to refer almost exclusively to non-state actors.

With the US and Israel gunning down starving civilians in Gaza every day, with wave after wave of terror attacks being committed inside Iran and across the Middle East by Mossad, the CIA and MI6, we should amend this erroneous habit.

The DGSE team who attached limpet mines to the Rainbow Warrior did so as psychopathic servants of the French State. Eyes of Fire: “At the time, Prime Minister David Lange described the Rainbow Warrior attack as ‘nothing more than a sordid act of international state-backed terrorism’.”

Don’t get me wrong. I am not “anti-French”. I lived for years in France, had a French girlfriend, studied French history, language and literature. I even had friends in Wellington who worked at the French Embassy.

Curiously when I lived next to Premier House, the official residence of the prime minister, my other next door neighbour was a French agent who specialised in surveillance. Our houses backed onto Premier House. Quelle coïncidence. To his mild consternation I’d greet him with “Salut, mon espion favori.” (Hello, my favourite spy).

What I despise is French colonialism, French racism, and what the French call magouillage. I don’t know a good English word for it . . .  it is a mix of shenanigans, duplicity, artful deception to achieve unscrupulous outcomes that can’t be publicly avowed. In brief: what the French attempted in Auckland in 1985.

Robie recounts in detail the lying, smokescreens and roadblocks that everyone from President Mitterrand through to junior officials put in the way of the New Zealand investigators. Mitterrand gave Prime Minister David Lange assurances that the culprits would be brought to justice. The French Embassy in Wellington claimed at the time: “In no way is France involved. The French government doesn’t deal with its opponents in such ways.”

It took years for the bombshell to explode that none other than Mitterrand himself had ordered the terrorist attack on New Zealand and Greenpeace!

We the people of the Pacific
We, the people of the Pacific, owe a debt to Greenpeace and all those who were part of the Rainbow Warrior, including author David Robie. We must remember the crime and call it by its name: state terrorism.

The French attempted to escape justice, deny involvement and then welched on the terms of the agreement negotiated with the help of the United Nations secretary-general.

A great way to honour the sacrifice of those who stood up for justice, who stood for peace and a nuclear-free Pacific, and who honoured our own national identity would be to buy David Robie’s excellent book.

I’ll give the last word to former Prime Minister Helen Clark:

“This is the time for New Zealand to link with the many small and middle powers across regions who have a vision for a world characterised by solidarity and peace and which can rise to the occasion to combat the existential challenges it faces — including of nuclear weapons, climate change, and artificial intelligence. If our independent foreign policy is to mean anything in the mid-2020s, it must be based on concerted diplomacy for peace and sustainable development.”

You cannot sink a rainbow.

Eugene Doyle is a writer based in Wellington. He has written extensively on the Middle East, as well as peace and security issues in the Asia Pacific region. He contributes to Asia Pacific Report and Café Pacific, and hosts the public policy platform solidarity.co.nz

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

In July 1985, Australia’s Pacific territory of Norfolk Island (pop. 2188) became the centre of a real life international spy thriller.

Four French agents sailed there on board the Ouvéa, a yacht from Kanaky New Caledonia, after bombing the Rainbow Warrior in Auckland, killing Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira.

The Rainbow Warrior was the flagship for a protest flotilla due to travel to Moruroa atoll to challenge French nuclear tests.

Australian police took them into custody on behalf of their New Zealand counterparts but then, bafflingly, allowed them to sail away, never to face justice.

On the 40th anniversary of the bombing (10 July 2025), award-winning journalist Richard Baker goes on an adventure from Paris to the Pacific to get the real story – and ultimately uncover the role that Australia played in the global headline-making affair.

The programme includes an interview with Pacific journalist David Robie, author of Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior. David’s article about this episode is published at Declassified Australia here.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Greenpeace activists on board the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior disrupted an industrial longlining fishing operation in the South Pacific, seizing almost 20 km of fishing gear and freeing nine sharks — including an endangered mako — near Australia and New Zealand.

Crew retrieved the entire longline and more than 210 baited hooks from a European Union-flagged industrial fishing vessel, including an endangered longfin mako shark, eight near-threatened blue sharks and four swordfish.

The crew also documented the vessel catching endangered sharks during its longlining operation.

The at-sea action followed new Greenpeace Australia Pacific analysis exposing the extent of shark catch from industrial longlining in parts of the Pacific Ocean.

Latest fisheries data showed that almost 70 percent of EU vessels’ catch was blue shark in 2023 alone.

The operation came ahead of this week’s UN Ocean Conference in Nice, France, where world leaders are discussing ocean protection and the Global Ocean Treaty.

On board the Rainbow Warrior, Greenpeace Australia Pacific campaigner Georgia Whitaker said: “These longliners are industrial killing machines. Greenpeace Australia Pacific took peaceful and direct action to disrupt this attack on marine life.

“We saved important species that would otherwise have been killed or left to die on hooks.

“The scale of industrial fishing — still legal on the high seas — is astronomical. These vessels claim to be targeting swordfish or tuna, but we witnessed shark after shark being hauled up by these industrial fleets, including three endangered sharks in just half an hour.

Rainbow Warrior crew disrupt longline fishing in the Pacific.  Video: Greenpeace

“Greenpeace is calling on world leaders at the UN Ocean Conference to protect 30 percent of the world’s oceans by 2030 from this wanton destruction.”

Stingray caught as bycatch is hauled onboard the Lu Rong Yuan Lu 212 longliner vessel in the Tasman Sea.

The Rainbow Warrior is in the South Pacific ocean to expose longline fishing and call on governments to ratify the Global Ocean Treaty and create a network of protected areas in the high seas.

Greenpeace Aotearoa is calling on the New Zealand government to ratify the Global Ocean Treaty and help create global ocean sanctuaries, including in the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand.

New Zealand signed the agreement in 2023.

More than two-thirds of sharks worldwide are endangered, and a third of those are at risk of extinction from overfishing.

Over the last three weeks, the Rainbow Warrior has been documenting longlining vessels and practices off Australia’s east coast, including from Spain and China.

Emma Page is Greenpeace Aotearoa’s communications lead, oceans and fisheries. Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Tuvalu has added its voice to the growing tide in the Pacific against deep sea mining, highlighting the momentum against this destructive industry, says Greenpeace.

The Tuvalu government’s call for a precautionary pause on deep sea mining took place at the 29th session of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) in Kingston, Jamaica.

Greenpeace head of Pacific Shiva Gounden congratulated the government of Tuvalu over its “commitment to protecting our oceans”.

“Tuvalu joins a growing chorus of Pacific nations calling for a ban on deep sea mining to safeguard our Moana, which gives and sustains life for millions of people across the Pacific and around the world,” he said in a statement.

“This announcement is courageous and historic, as the proud island nation of Tuvalu again shows global leadership on ocean protection just like they have on climate protection, something we Pacific people see as deeply interconnected.

“The momentum growing against the destructive deep sea mining industry is undeniable.

“For too long, profit-hungry corporations have plundered and exploited the ocean and high seas at the expense of the communities who depend on them, and whose lives and cultures are intrinsically linked with our oceans.”

Pacific says ‘no more’
Gounden said the message was loud and clear — “Pacific Island nations say, no more”.

Tuvalu’s announcement follows statements from the Pacific nations of Vanuatu and Palau at the ISA, with both governments supporting a pause on deep sea mining to protect the oceans for generations to come.

A total of 31 countries, including the UK and Germany, have committed to a moratorium.

Greenpeace Aotearoa spokesperson Juressa Lee (Te Rarawa, Ngāpuhi, Rarotonga) welcomed the decisions by Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Palau.

“Pacific peoples are standing up and saying no to deep sea mining. Deep sea mining will do nothing to benefit the people of the Moana but will instead exacerbate the climate and biodiversity crises,” she said.

“Extractivism is just continued colonisation of our heritage lands and waters, livelihoods and ways we see the world, and deep sea mining is no different.

“The intrinsic links to the Moana that Pacific Peoples speak about is valuable matauranga.

“There is so much in Pacific knowledge and culture that can teach us how to live connected to the ocean while also taking care of it.

“After hundreds of years of extraction causing climate disaster and biodiversity loss, governments are now resisting and turning toward Indigenous leadership and today we’ve seen some in the Pacific leading the way.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

People in Vanuatu remain optimistic about their future after two destructive cyclones in two days left parts of the Pacific nation in ruins.

Authorities are yet to determine the full scale of the damage caused by the back-to-back severe tropical cyclones Judy and Kevin.

But those who had to endure the worst of the natural disasters last week believe demonstrating resilience is their only option.

“To have had two category four cyclones in less than a week is history in itself,” Vanuatu’s only female Member of Parliament, Gloria Julia King, told RNZ Pacific.

“[It’s] something that even the elders in our families haven’t seen before.”

She said her island nation has had its fair share of severe weather events, highlighting the destruction caused by Cyclone Pam in 2015 from which the country has still not fully recovered.

“A lot of our schools are still in makeshift classrooms, [children] still sitting on the floor without desks and chairs.”

Hopeful over challenges
But she is hopeful that the ni-Vanuatu people will get through the challenges in front of them.

“I have seen Vanuatu come back from Pam, I’ve seen Vanuatu come back from Harold, and I am positive Vanuatu will be able to bounce back from Kevin,” King said.

The country was hit by a category 4 TC Judy first on March 3, but just as people started to pick up the pieces, they had to rush to evacuation centres the following day as Kevin arrived as a category 3, intensifying to a category 4 and then reaching 5 over open water.

“People [were] carrying people with disabilities on their back to an evacuation building,” Greenpeace Australia Pacific’s advisor Shiva Gounden, who is in the capital Port Vila, said.

He said three to four families huddled in homes while properties around them were being wiped out.

“Roads are completely blocked or flooded. There’s no access for anyone to leave the village for any type of emergencies.”

‘No power, no water’
“There’s no power. There’s no water,” he added.

Gounden was in a village on Efate island helping people prepare for TC Kevin when it hit with a force much more violent than anyone was prepared for, he told RNZ Pacific.

He had to hold the doors of the house he was residing in for almost 10 hours in shin high water to remain safe.

“It was extremely strong,” he said, describing Kevin’s ferocity.

“I’ve seen and responded to several cyclones in my life and I felt Kevin was as strong as Cyclone Winston which wiped out Fiji.”

“I was trying to hold my door from 5pm till about 3am. I was using all my [strength] with my hands and my back and my legs to try and hold the door because if I didn’t, it would snap. There was water everywhere,” he said.

‘It’s a tough go for many’, says Vanuatu journalist
Vanuatu journalist Dan McGarry, who has been on the frontlines documenting the disaster, visited vulnerable communities in the aftermath.

Taila Moses and her son Tom stand in front of what was once their home of 16 years. Countless houses in informal communities such as hers were damaged or destroyed. Cyclones dole put their damage indiscriminately, but society’s most vulnerable feel it more than anyone else. pic.twitter.com/cXBDuznMTz

— Dan McGarry (@dailypostdan) March 5, 2023

He said people were living in “impromptu housing” in various parts of Port Vila.

“What I found was quite disturbing,” he said.

“It’s becoming obvious that the increasing reliance on a cash economy is creating inequalities in terms of people’s ability to cope with this kind of disaster cycle.”

McGarry said informal settlements up on the hillside in the capital were covered with clothing lines because everything had been soaked.

“There were tarpaulins pulled across roofs to provide some sort of temporary shelter.”

He has spoken with several residents and shared the story of one woman who has lost everything.

“She has no livelihood at the moment because her employer, of course, isn’t calling her into work,” he said.

“She’s lost everything and she is without the means to return it. It’s a tough, tough go for a great many people here in Port Vila,” he explained.

Climate crisis issue
Climate crisis is front of mind for Ni-Vanuatu residents as they start to rebuild.

“[Climate change] turns what used to be sort of periodical issues for Pacific island nations into chronic ones,” he said.

“In this case, we’ve had two severe cyclones in the course of a week an as New Zealanders have seen these weather systems are moving further south.”

He believes development partners of the Pacific cannot afford to walk away; a sentiment echoed by Gounden.

“We have the most resilient people, but there is a deep hurt that is within us,” Gounden said.

He said the “the hurt” stems from fossil fuels being burned across the world which exacerbates climate change.

“The people of the Pacific contribute the least to climate change, yet we face the greatest consequences of it all.”

“The biggest thing we can do is pressure world leaders right now to phase out [the use of fossil fuels.”

Meanwhile, Australia, France and New Zealand have been the first to send support to assist with emergency response.

“We will appreciate any help we can get,” King said.

“The biggest challenge now is just getting power and water back into full circuit around the country.”

Taking off for Vanuatu with assistance following TC Judy & TC Kevin. Australia has a rapid assessment team in Vanuatu & is delivering shelters & other items for communities.

We stand with the Pacific family #YugetaYumiStrong pic.twitter.com/IGYVrchew9

— Pat Conroy MP (@PatConroy1) March 5, 2023

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Owen Wilkes (1940–2005) was known throughout the Pacific and across the world as an outstanding researcher on peace and disarmament.

His work:

• exposed plans to build a US Navy satellite tracking station in the Southern Alps
• identified a foreign spy base at Tangimoana (near Bulls)
• led to job offers from leading peace research institutes in Norway and Sweden — and an espionage charge for taking photographs during a cycling holiday, and
• supported local campaigns against foreign military activity in the Philippines, and for a nuclear-free Pacific.

Born in Christchurch, Owen Wilkes was an internationalist and a dedicated New Zealander — a subsistence farmer on the West Coast (where his self-built eco-home was demolished by the local council), an archaeologist, tramper and yachtsman.

In this forthcoming book, edited by historian Mark Derby and Wilkes’ former partner May Bass, experts in their own fields who knew and worked with him reflect on his achievements and his legacy. The contributors include:

Ingvar Botnen
Nils Petter Gleditsch
Nicky Hager
Di Hooper
Murray Horton
Maire Leadbeater
Robert Mann
Neville Ritchie
David Robie
Ken Ross
Peter Wills

The book, published by Raekaihau Press in association with Steele Roberts Aotearoa, has a timeline, a bibliography of Owen’s publications in several languages, and an index.

The book is being published on November 30.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The office of the Tahitian president says it wants to honour the memory of Bruno Barrillot who was the head of French Polynesia’s organisation looking at the aftermath of France’s nuclear weapons tests.

The office says it wants to mark the sixth anniversary of Barrillot’s return from France to French Polynesia.

He died less than a year later, shortly before his 77th birthday.

In 2013, Barrillot was sacked by the newly-elected government led by Gaston Flosse, which objected to funding his agency.

His dismissal was widely condemned because he was considered to be the most knowledgeable person about the French tests.

The test veterans’ organisation Moruroa e Tatou said he was pursued by a “vengeful hatred” that did no justice to the government.

Military sites Moruroa, Hao
In 2016, the government reinstated him — three years after the Flosse sacking.

Barrillot’s duties included work on the rehabilitation of the former test-related military sites on Moruroa and Hao as well as assisting in efforts to amend the French nuclear testing compensation law.

In 1984, Barrillot, a French-born priest, founded the NGO Arms Observatory and after the French sinking of the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior in July 1985 he focused on the damage caused by the nuclear tests in the Pacific.

He was also the co-founder of French Polynesia’s nuclear test veteran organisations.

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

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Only people power can ensure genuine enduring progress on climate and people need to know the truth if they are to act on it. For that reason greenwashing is the enemy of progress on climate and where you stand on greenwashing is the Rubicon of our times.

I have spent decades of my life as a climate activist fighting various deliberate forms of climate science denial propagated by climate polluting companies and their allied political parties, politicians, lobby groups and commentators.

The good news is that we have mostly won that battle. The bad news is that they have a new tactic, greenwashing, which is now a major obstacle to progress on climate change. Greenwashing is when businesses or politicians give a false impression, or spin, on their products or policies to give the impression that they have a positive impact on the environment when they don’t.

We now face a new landscape in which even oil companies claim to be doing their bit for the climate with “carbon offsets” and “2050 net zero goals”. Their aim is to stop real action on climate by making people think it is all under control.

One of the jobs of the government is to sort out the real climate actions from the greenwashing, to hold industry to account. And of course, one of the jobs of the government is to not engage in greenwashing themselves.

The problem with some of the actions of the current Aotearoa New Zealand government is that rather than holding business to account for its greenwashing, on some vital climate issues the government is actually a proponent of greenwashing.

This greenwashing is closely linked to a wrong-headed theory of change which we hear repeatedly from this government — the idea that climate issues can only be solved through consensus, especially consensus with the polluters and their representatives. The idea that we can’t make real policy to cut climate pollution without the consent of the polluters and their representatives is dangerous and inconsistent with the history of making change.

There are fundamental conflicts in the climate policy space — some industries will not accept that they need to cut emissions. The attempt to gloss over these conflicts and seek consensus means the government adopts policies that the polluters will accept, and which consequently do not cut emissions. This policy outcome is then sold to the public as a great victory when in truth it is a defeat — it is greenwashed.

Before getting into the specifics of the problems I want to acknowledge that this government has done some good things on climate. The ban on new oil and gas exploration permits was a win, even though it excluded onshore Taranaki and allowed existing permits to be extended.

The cap on synthetic nitrogen fertiliser was a win, even though it is a very high cap which has yet to be enforced. Greenpeace publicly celebrated these wins and congratulated the government on making these decisions, even while pointing out their limitations.

I tried to provide a transparent assessment of the environmental performance of the Ardern government back in 2020. I spent a decade as Green Party co-leader and I know there are wins and losses in politics and that compromise is a reality of politics in a healthy democracy.

But honestly admitted compromise is one thing, and greenwashing is another.

There will always be arguments as to what is an acceptable political compromise. We need to separate the issue of what is an acceptable compromise to enter government from the issue of greenwashing. Determining what is an acceptable compromise for the Greens to join the Labour government is formally a matter of decision for the Green Party and the Labour Party rather than the climate movement.

People like me are entitled to our views of the compromise, but it is the Green Party and the Labour Party that have to decide if it’s worth it. I am not a member of the Green Party or the Labour Party.

The issue of greenwashing, however, is an issue which is of direct and immediate concern for the wider climate movement. This is because when the government sells their policies as great climate advances, when in reality they are not, it misleads the wider public and the climate movement.

People can think they don’t need to push hard on climate because it is under control, when it is not. We then need to spend our time highlighting and explaining why the claimed win is actually spin, rather than campaigning for meaningful action.

This undermines our ability to get more significant progress on climate policy because the power and leadership to get progress on climate (like all other progressive issues) comes from civil society and if civil society is disarmed by greenwashing then climate policy follows dead end paths, stalls or  stops.

But why is greenwashing the biggest challenge the climate movement faces at the moment. How did we get here?

Goals remain unchanged, but tactics evolve
As I mentioned above, the first thing to understand is that climate policy is unavoidably and irrevocably conflictual, and hence political. That is because on the one hand the enduring overarching goal of big climate polluters in the fossil fuel business and industrial agribusiness is to prevent government regulations that will force them to cut their climate emissions.

While on the other hand the climate movement aims for emission cuts to achieve a stable climate.

This is a fundamental conflict globally, and in Aotearoa, and no amount of pseudo consensus can wish this conflict away.

Big climate polluters believe, rightly, that government regulation and pricing to drive emissions reductions threatens their business models and profitability. Other sectors of the economy, such as IT, can more easily adapt to a low carbon future, but those businesses in the industries like coal and synthetic fertiliser can’t adapt, and they intend to fight efforts to cut emissions all the way.

While their goal of preventing government regulation to force reductions in emissions has remained consistent, their tactics to achieve this goal have changed. And it is understanding the way their tactics have evolved that it becomes clear just how problematic the current government’s climate policies have become.

At the beginning the tactic they used was to deny the compelling weight of scientific evidence supporting the theory of human induced climate change. Climate denial was stock in trade for many right wing parties and agribusiness and oil industry lobby groups from the 1990s through to the 2010s.

But after a while that stopped working so they changed tactics to stressing uncertainty especially in the 2000s. They said climate change might be a thing, but there is so much uncertainty so we shouldn’t do anything about it. They played up the nature of scientific inquiry — that theories are not beyond questioning because they are not religious texts — to emphasise uncertainty and the need for delay. It was really just another form of climate denialism.

Billions spent on climate denialism
The polluting industries spent billions promoting climate denialism and uncertainty in order to block government regulation to cut emissions. They bought politicians, public relations firms and sadly some scientists to promote these ideas to delay action on climate. Their ideas were reproduced widely by the conservative commentariat, and many still are.

I spent many years of my life fighting climate denialism and eventually through the efforts of millions of climate activists we (mostly) won the battle against climate denialism. There are now few major governments or corporations or industry lobby groups that rely on climate denialist arguments to block government regulation to cut emissions.

Straight out climate science deniers have been pushed to the margins like Groundswell or the Act Party.

But the goal of the fossil fuel and agribusiness polluters remains consistent — they still want to stop government regulation to cut emissions — so they need a new tactic. And that tactic is greenwashing.

These days the polluters and their representatives say, “yes climate change is a thing” and “yes we should do something about it and you will be happy to know that we are doing something about it.”

Hence, they argue, there is no need for government regulation. Even though they spent the last 30 years blocking every attempt to reduce emissions and even denying climate science, they argue that they now take it seriously and there is absolutely no need for the government to do anything.

And what they are doing is often nonsense like net carbon zero targets in 2050 or buying offshore carbon credits or an industry controlled pricing mechanism like He Waka Eke Noa, or nitrification inhibitors etc. They don’t actually cut emissions in any significant way.

The purpose of greenwashing may seem relatively retail when it is done by a single company to sell stuff to consumers, but at a systemic level the purpose of greenwashing is to head off government attempts to introduce regulations and pricing that will force emission reductions.

There are of course some corporations and governments taking significant actions to cut emissions, but there are also many corporate and government actions that are just greenwashing.

Separating out the genuine climate actions from greenwashing is something that defines the climate politics of our time. And this is why the approach taken by the New Zealand government is so very problematic. People assume that the Climate Minister, especially a Green Party Climate Minister, will not perpetuate greenwashing, and will call it out, but it has not always been the case with James Shaw, and that makes it all the more insidious.

Government greenwashes the biggest polluter: Agribusiness
Which brings us to the problem with the current New Zealand government climate policy. Climate policy in this country mostly boils down to what you are doing about agribusiness emissions (biogenic agriculture emissions alone are about 50 percent of emissions) and transport (20 percent). The rest matters too but if you aren’t tackling these two then you aren’t tackling climate change.

Transport policy has not been great from a climate perspective but here I want to focus on the bigger problem — agribusiness — particularly intensive dairy.

We have had the same Prime Minister and the same Climate Minister for the nearly five years of this government. There have been a plethora of nice sounding climate announcements — the PM said that climate was her generation’s “nuclear free moment”, we’ve had the so-called Zero Carbon Act, a climate emergency declaration, an independent climate commission established, emissions reductions plans, improved nationally determined targets for reduction, signed the global methane pledge etc.

But there is still no effective government policy to cut emissions from agribusiness, by far the biggest polluter.

The problem is not just that the government is doing virtually nothing to cut emissions from agribusiness, the problem is that it is saying that it is taking climate change seriously.

It is equivalent to the Australian government doing nothing about coal or the Canadian government doing nothing about tar sands oil — all while telling us how seriously they take climate change. This is greenwashing and it is dangerous because many people think climate action is happening.

When the claims of meaningful action are fronted by a “nuclear free-moment” Prime Minister and a Green Party Climate Minister – the general observer could be forgiven for trusting that those claims are true.

The evidence that this government has done very little to cut agribusiness emissions is bountiful but let me focus on just one central area — agriculture and the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).

Taking government at its word
The government repeatedly tells us that the Emissions Trading Scheme is the most important tool to cut emissions. This is debatable but let us take them at their word.

If it is so important then why, 14 years after the ETS began in 2008, is the biggest polluting sector, agribusiness, still exempt from the ETS? For 14 years agribusiness lobbyists and industry groups such as Federated Farmers and Dairy NZ have successfully fought a battle of predatory delay to stop their sector facing a price on emissions, apparently the most important climate tool.

And every government (Clark, Key, Ardern) has given them exactly what they want — perpetual delay.

When the ETS was passed into law in 2008, the Labour government of the day delayed agriculture’s entry until 2013. A bad start.

At the time, myself and many others argued against the delay but the Clark government wouldn’t budge. The John Key-Bill English National government (2008-2017) that followed, delayed agriculture’s entry indefinitely. From the perspective of agribusiness, delaying is winning, and they were winning.

For a moment in 2017/2018 it looked like the newly elected Ardern government might have the courage of its convictions and that the agribusiness lobby would finally lose its battle to stop climate action.

The Labour-NZ First coalition agreement explicitly committed them to support agriculture’s entry into the ETS at 5 percent of its obligations. With NZ First’s vote secured, there was a Parliamentary majority to bring agriculture into the ETS. Finally.

Backed down under pressure
But then in 2019 the Jacinda Ardern and James Shaw backed down to agribusiness pressure and instead of agriculture facing a price on its emissions they adopted an industry proposal — He Waka Eke Noa.

He Waka Eke Noa was a proposal from agribusiness for a joint government-agribusiness initiative looking at pricing agribusiness climate pollution. In effect He Waka Eke Noa handed over to industry the design of the system to price their own pollution. New Zealand agribusiness was beside themselves with joy.

In time it would become clear that it was not just that industry would design the system, but they would design a system that they would control going forward.

And, the target date for starting pricing was 2025. That was two elections away — 2020 and 2023 —  and the chances of the current ministers still being there was remote. And if they did manage to win in 2020 and 2023, it was almost unheard of for a government to win a fourth term in 2026 so anything implemented in 2025 could be easily undone.

He Waka Eke Noa’s timelines left the industry partying. And as for the politicians, none of them were likely to be around to get the blame when nothing happened either.

In one of the defining moments of this government’s climate inaction, Jacinda Ardern and James Shaw stood next to Dairy NZ and Federated Farmers to launch the five year He Waka Eke Noa project, instead of implementing their own policy of immediately putting agriculture into the ETS.

James Shaw celebrated He Waka Eke Noa and went so far as to say “nothing about us without us” —  that is he used the slogan of the disability advocacy movement to infer that the agribusiness sector shouldn’t be regulated without their consent and agreement. That was a real low point I must say.

Predictably, three years of delay later, in 2022, the final report from He Waka Eke Noa was released detailing a complicated system that would cut agribusiness emissions by less than 1 percent. The headline reduction was higher but that is because it included the reductions that are supposed to come from technologies that don’t currently exist (magic bullets), the reductions that result from the unrelated freshwater regulations, and the reductions that come out of the waste sector.

Incidentally agribusiness has been saying those same magic bullets have been just around the corner for the last 20 years. If you strip out reductions projected to come from magic bullets, freshwater regulations and waste, the emissions reductions from the He Waka Eke Noa pricing mechanism are less than 1 percent. In addition, under the proposal industry would control the mechanism for regulating their own pollution — classic industry capture.

From the industry perspective He Waka Eke Noa was designed to stop government regulation i.e. stop agribusiness going into the ETS. Under criticism from Groundswell, both Federated Farmers and DairyNZ touted their achievement in keeping their industry out of the ETS.

The National Party also voiced its support for the final report. The Climate Minister was a little more muted.

Most people listening to the government talk about He Waka Eke Noa would think that it has been a tremendous success — after all doesn’t the government always say it wants consensus on climate? Whereas in fact its sole success has been to delay government regulation of agribusiness climate pollution — by three years so far — and, even if it were implemented, by its own calculations emissions would be reduced by less than 1 percent.

That is what consensus with polluters looks like and that is the corner that Ardern and Shaw have painted themselves into.

The purpose of greenwashing is to make us think industry is finally taking climate seriously and hence there is no need for government regulation, while in reality very little is happening to cut emissions.

He Waka Eke Noa is a perfect example of greenwashing:

• It looks like industry is taking climate change seriously with media coverage of all their hard work;
• The new scheme, if it is implemented, is controlled by industry, so full industry capture;
• The scheme has almost no impact on actually reducing emissions; and
• Even if, god forbid, the government were to reject He Waka Eke Noa and instead revert to putting agribusiness into the ETS when it makes a decision in late 2022, it is too late for that decision to be fully institutionalised before the next election, so it will be easily removed if there is a change of government in 2023 and not so hard even after the 2026 election. Predatory delay has been such a successful tactic so far for the industry, why change now?

The Glasgow target
The decisions by this government not to cut agribusiness emissions created cascading international problems of perception for the New Zealand government when it was required to offer a new target for emissions reductions at the Glasgow climate conference in November 2021.

The government wanted to look good with an ambitious target (known as a Nationally Determined Contribution) but had few policies to actually cut emissions. Other countries were raising doubts about the government’s climate commitment. The ETS was supposed to do the heavy lifting but, as the Climate Commission admitted recently, under current settings the “NZ ETS is likely to deliver mostly new plantation forestry rather than gross emission reductions”.

The answer was to use the potential future purchase of overseas carbon offsets to present a net target that looked ambitious.

The Climate Minister announced with great fanfare that New Zealand would commit to a 50 percent cut in net emissions below 2005 levels by 2030. NZ paraded its 50 percent target around the Glasgow climate conference. It sounds good until you realise not only does the target use tricky accounting to make it look much larger than it is, but that TWO THIRDS of the emissions reductions would come from buying offshore carbon offsets.

Sorry about the shouty capitals but nothing yells “greenwashing” quite like offshore carbon offsetting. Carbon offsets are notoriously corrupt, open to double counting, and are the carbon equivalent of papal indulgences. They are what you do when you don’t have policy to cut emissions but want to look good.

Yet this is the government’s plan to reach our international climate target — greenwashing. The Climate Commission has urged the government to contract the offsets fast: “It is essential that the government secure access to sources of offshore mitigation as soon as possible”. Instead of, you know, actually cutting emissions.

And just to show the government is not without a sense of humour they signed up to the global methane pledge to cut methane emissions — without a plan to cut methane emissions! In fact, in case industry was worried, when Shaw returned from Glasgow he confirmed that the government would not introduce any new policies to cut methane. Moooo.

But what about the giant climate bureaucratic superstructure?
Faced with this evidence of greenwashing on agribusiness and the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) some people say “what about the Zero Carbon Act”? That proves they are serious doesn’t it? I think that we do need institutional reform to deal with climate, and I’ve pointed to what we need and some of the problems of the Zero Carbon Act before, but it should not be at the expense of immediate climate action.

Much of the government’s climate policy focus in the last five years has been on building an elaborate climate bureaucratic structure. This began with the years-long process to get cross-party support for the Zero Carbon Act, the years-long process to establish the Climate Commission, then there was the years-long processes to build the carbon budgets and the Emissions Reduction Plan.

These structures and processes do look good but they don’t cut emissions – only regulations and policies that cut emissions actually cut emissions. Now you might argue that over time this bureaucratic superstructure will lead to significant emission reductions, and maybe they will, and maybe they won’t, and maybe they can be improved.

The problem is we don’t have years to wonder and hope. We need to have been tangibly cutting actual emissions for the last five years, and cutting them harder over the next five, if we are to play any part in stalling global climate catastrophe.

Spending five years on not implementing much policy to cut emissions, in order to implement a bureaucratic superstructure that might result in emissions cuts down the road if a future government has the courage to use the climate superstructure to implement the policies that this one has not, is plainly not a serious policy to cut emissions. Just implement the policies.

However, in agriculture, our biggest polluter, there is no ambiguity that this climate policy structure has delivered nothing. The Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) has almost nothing to offer except magical technologies that don’t currently exist. The government’s excuse for offering no serious policy on cutting agribusiness emissions in the ERP is, you guessed it, He Waka Eke Noa. Predictably Federated Farmers really liked the Emission Reduction Plan, because it, you know, didn’t reduce agribusiness emissions!

The 2022-23 Budget that followed the ERP allocated $710 million over four years to agribusiness climate initiatives, but it turns out the money is to look for magic bullets to cut emissions. And some of these magic bullets might be worse — recently $11 million was given to research nitrification inhibitors that kill soil biology in order to cut nitrous oxide emissions following the application of synthetic nitrogen fertilisers.

Killing our soils is the exact opposite of what we need to do. The money in the ERP comes from ETS revenue paid by others, because agribusiness is not required to pay into the Emissions Trading Scheme. It is a giant subsidy from everyone else to agribusiness to maintain the pretence of climate action.

It seems a big price to pay to maintain the pretence — it would be a lot cheaper just to paint the cows green.

Some might argue that the climate bureaucratic superstructure may not achieve much in reality, but it is not actually harmful. Sure, the argument goes, this elaborate policy superstructure has wasted lots of time and energy which could have gone into policies that would actually cut emissions, but it is harmless enough.

Well, maybe you’d only think that if you haven’t been following the litigation. Crown Law, the government’s lawyers, are using the Zero Carbon Act etc to actually block climate action in the courts. Here are two quick examples.

In the most recent case against the Energy Minister’s decision to issue more onshore oil and gas exploration permits, the Minister’s lawyers argued that the Zero Carbon Act allowed for more oil and gas exploration and so it was fine. This is in spite of the fact that the world already has more oil and gas reserves than can be burnt to stay under the 1.5 degree guidance that is in the Zero Carbon Act.

Previously climate lawyers have been able to argue that the global situation for oil and gas must be taken into account but now, significantly, under the Zero Carbon Act, the Crown argues you can only consider the New Zealand situation. So the Zero Carbon Act is being used to justify oil exploration and protect it from legal attack by climate activists.

And in a previous case against the Climate Commission, James Shaw’s lawyers argued that the 1.5 degree target in the Zero Carbon Act was only “aspirational” and not binding on the government.

Marc Daalder reported it thus:

“Crown Law counsel Polly Higbee told the High Court references to 1.5 degrees [in the Zero Carbon Act] used “broad, aspirational language” and it would be “too prescriptive” to argue that the purpose section placed any actual duty on the Government.”

No actual duty on the government from the 1.5 degree target in the Zero Carbon Act is what Shaw’s lawyers told the court. Outside the court, when speaking to climate activists, Shaw says that the 1.5 degrees target is binding, but in court, where it matters, his lawyers argue it is not.

It’s hard to think of a clearer example of greenwashing. There were many people in the climate movement who worked hard to deliver the Zero Carbon Act and honestly believed it would be a significant tool to cut emissions, rather than defend oil exploration against legal attack.

The final argument for these bland instruments like the Zero Carbon Act is that we need to get broad political elite consensus on climate to get change. History tells us the opposite. To choose just one example which is close to the PM’s heart — nuclear free.

Nuclear free New Zealand was not a result of a consensus process. It was vociferously opposed by the National Party and its many allies — they voted against the legislation and spoke out against it. Nuclear free NZ was not won by reducing our ambitions to what was acceptable to the National Party and the US State Department.

Thousands of peace and environment activists campaigned for it and the Labour government eventually came round to their position, and stood up to provide leadership. There was no political elite consensus. The reason that the National Party never repealed the nuclear free legislation when they returned to government in 1990 was because of its broad support from civil society, support that resulted from civil society campaigners and a Prime Minister willing to fight for the policy (once he finally came round to it).

Introducing vacuous climate legislation that achieves little, in order to get the National Party to vote for it, is pointless, or worse.

Winning the debate on real climate action is the only way to ensure it sticks, and greenwashing undermines that public campaigning.

Conclusion
During the 2017 election campaign I bumped into Jacinda Ardern in Wellington airport and she told me my job at Greenpeace was to hold her government accountable. I respected her for saying that and I agreed with it, and still do. And so that is what I’m doing.

The government has done some good stuff on climate, but on the really big and difficult climate policy issues they are greenwashing. And the greenwashing has disoriented and weakened the climate movement and meant that we are getting much weaker climate policy out of this government than we would otherwise.

And I refer to Ardern rather than Shaw deliberately because there is an uncomfortable political reality that sits behind all this: Jacinda Ardern makes the climate policy in this government and James Shaw presents it. The first rule of politics is to learn how to count — look at the numbers and you will understand this government — Labour has a simple majority and Shaw isn’t even in Cabinet.

James Shaw may like the climate policy, he may not, I don’t know. He may be the architect of crucial bits of it, or not, I don’t know. He is allowed to say he would like to improve the climate policy, but he cannot speak out against it and keep his job. And once you dwell on that hard political truth, all this makes a lot more sense.

It’s not my job or Greenpeace’s job to say whether that is an acceptable position for the Green Party to find itself in, but it is our job to call out greenwash when we see it. We believe that only people power can ensure genuine enduring progress on climate and people need to know the truth if they are to act on it.

For that reason greenwashing is the enemy of progress on climate and where you stand on greenwashing is the Rubicon of our times.

Dr Russel Norman is executive director of Greenpeace Aotearoa and was co-leader of the Green Party for nine years. He resigned from Parliament as an MP in 2015 to take up the Greenpeace position.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Australia is accused of using “diplomatic strong-arm tactics” to water down outcomes in Pacific climate negotiations and “buy silence” on climate change, a new report has revealed.

Greenpeace Australia Pacific’s report, Australia: Pacific Bully and International Outcast, reveals that the Australian government uses “bullying tactics” in regional negotiations on climate change, according to former Pacific Island leaders interviewed as part of the study.

The leaders include former Kiribati President Anote Tong and former Prime Minister of Tuvalu Bikenibeu Paeniu.

Australia’s aid to the Pacific has been “greenwashed”, with some of the largest and most expensive “climate adaptation” projects having no link to climate change or contributing to increase the climate resilience of Pacific peoples.

The Australian government’s climate position harms its international relations and economy with Australia’s export markets for coal and gas shrinking as major trading partners such as Japan and South Korea commit to net-zero emissions, says the report, published coinciding with the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow.

The report draws on dozens of interviews with present and former Pacific leaders, Australian diplomats and academics to expose the hardline tactics used by Australia to thwart stronger regional action on climate change and to shift focus away from Australia’s responsibility to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The report also uncovers the greenwashing of Australian aid in the Pacific, finding that millions of aid dollars have been given to “climate adaptation” projects that do not have any link to climate change.

Australian standing damaged
Greenpeace Australia Pacific researcher and international relations expert Dr Alex Edney-Browne said the investigation showed Australia’s international standing had been damaged by its climate obstruction.

“Australia has lost its once-respected position in the Pacific and now has a reputation for bullying and strong-arm diplomatic tactics to thwart regional climate action,” she said.

“Pacific Island leaders are some of the world’s strongest climate advocates, but Australia has brazenly tried to buy their silence through aid with strings attached.

“Morrison’s last-minute commitment at COP26 this week to increase regional climate finance by $500 milion, via bilateral agreements, simply won’t cut it. Given the level of greenwashing going on in Australia’s foreign aid to the Pacific as revealed in this report, there is also no guarantee that this money will go where it’s needed to increase the climate resiliency of Pacific peoples,” she said.

“Australia has a history of using bilateral aid as a way of gaining leverage over Pacific island countries. It would be nice to see Australia being a good international citizen and showing support for multilateral climate finance such as the UN’s Green Climate Fund. It refuses to do so.

“Australia must make a serious effort on climate change, which is threatening the very survival of Pacific nations. That means ruling out any new coal or gas projects, ending the billions in subsidies given to the fossil fuel industry and committing to a science-based target to cut emissions by 75 percent this decade to bring it up to speed with our regional neighbours and trading partners.”

Gareth Evans, a former Australian foreign minister, said Australia’s climate policy was already hurting the country’s diplomatic standing.

‘Reputation for decency’
“A country’s reputation for decency in these matters does really, really matter… Australia’s credibility in all sorts of ways depends on our being seen to be responsible, good international citizens and Australia is putting that reputation very much at risk on the climate front,” he said.

Anote Tong, former President of Kiribati, said Australia had not acted in the spirit of mutual respect in its dealings with the Pacific on climate change.

“I cannot read into the minds of Australian leaders but it’s always been my hope that we would treat each other with mutual respect, but I’m not sure this has always been the case,” he said.

“But we should be partners in every respect and not when it is convenient to one party but not the other, for example on climate change. We expect Australia to be stepping forward because climate change is very important for us and we’re meant to be part of this family. It had always been my expectation, my hope, that Australia would provide the leadership we desperately need on climate change.”

Dr Matt McDonald, associate professor of International Relations at University of Queensland, refers to Australia’s climate policies as a “perfect storm”, with serious repercussions for the country’s regional and international relations if these policies remain weak by comparison with similar developed countries.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A former Rainbow Warrior campaigner and Greenpeace International technical manager, Davey Edward, has died in Perth, Australia. He was 68.

Edward had a long history with Greenpeace. He started sailing with the global environmental movement in 1983 and was chief engineer on board the first Rainbow Warrior when it was bombed by French secret agents in Auckland in 1985.

Earlier that year, he had been part of the Rainbow Warrior mission to relocate the Rongelap Atoll community in the Marshall islands who had suffered from US nuclear tests.

After that UK-born Edward sailed as chief engineer on several expeditions, including the Antarctic.

Since his sailing career, Edward returned several times to Greenpeace, and left Greenpeace in the early 1990s.

Since 2007, Davey Edward had filled the position of technical manager. Several times he left for other opportunities, although his passion for Greenpeace brought him back every time.

Edward always got back to his passion to fight for the environment, and always wanted to be on side to ensure that the ships would be ready for their next mission.

He also played a big role in the building of the new Rainbow Warrior and was at the construction in 2010.

About 5 years ago Edward was diagnosed with cancer – and the prognosis was very bad. The doctors told him he probably only had several months left, and he battled the cancer with the same determination and spirit that he had for his environmental battles.

He continued to work and support Greenpeace in the background after he left for Australia/ New Zealand for treatment in 2016, and surprised the doctors with his determination, strength and optimism during this fight.

Meanwhile, he continued to enjoy life, refurbishing a house in New Zealand and enjoyed good Belgian and other craft beers.

Crew planner Justin Veenstra at Greenpeace International recalls:

“When I talked to Davey last month, it was the first time in many years I heard serious doubts in his voice. He wanted to remain strong and positive, but got out after a hospital admission and it seemed that the doctor’s message that he had to start ‘making arrangements’ was a message he had to consider seriously.

“He mentioned he still hoped to go to his lovely wooden house in The Netherlands and catch up for a beer and discussion about the world and GP, but unfortunately he never made it.

“Last night, I got the message from his wife Patti that Davey had passed away at 0500 [Friday] morning. Things went down very quickly in the last few days and weeks …”

Waiheke Island environmental campaigner and author Margaret Mills, who was relief cook on the Rainbow Warrior in 1985 at the time of the bombing and Edward’s best friend over many years, recalls:

“When we last met on Waiheke, no matter what we talked about we always found something to laugh about. We both agreed that we loathed the expression ‘passed away’  because, as Davey said succinctly, ‘We aren’t going anywhere, we just die.’ He talked almost non-stop about all sorts of things — Taumarunui and how much he loved the place.

“We had been down to stay with him when he had nearly finished his massive restoration job. As with everything he did, he gave it everything he had and had done a magnificent job. At that time he was fighting cancer.

“His car, a Triumph, was to be sold because it is now worth a considerable sum. He had taken it to Timaru where there was an old mechanic who could get parts in the UK, but the car has now been inherited by John.

“I knew Davey and his family on a more personal level than anyone else. I babysat John, I found them a place to rent on Waiheke. John thinks of me as his grandmother.

“They were happy days on board the Rainbow Warrior.”

Eyes of Fire author David Robie remembers Davey Edward as a determined, courageous and principled campaigner, “always dedicated to improving Greenpeace’s marine protest and ship strategies no matter what”.

“One of the old school campaigners, he will be sorely missed by his colleagues and friends.”

Edward is survived by his wife, Patti, his son John, and his two granddaughters.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz