The terrorist ‘heroes’ of Mariupol

Written By: - Date published: 4:44 pm, May 21st, 2022 - 128 comments
Categories: Christchurch Attack, terrorism, Ukraine, war - Tags:

The mass surrender of over 2000 members of  the extreme nationalist AZOV battalion who have just been flushed out of their bunker in Mariupol is a major win in the fight against global race-based terrorism.  These extreme nationalists share the same ideology as the Christchurch and Buffalo assassins, as is clear from their manifestos. Efforts to combat extremism have focused on the influence of social media on individuals.  Insufficient attention is paid to organising centres such as AZOV.

Western reaction to the Russian ‘special operation’ to ‘de-nazify’ Ukraine has airbrushed out the activities of the extremist right organisations such as AZOV, the military arm of the ultra-nationalist political movement  integrated into Ukrainian military. The surrender and capture of this battalion’s remnants and the liberation of the Russian-speaking territories in eastern Ukraine will now enable clear light at trial to be shed on their terrorist activities, many of which now coming to light are horrific.

The  links between the Christchurch and Buffalo assassins are referenced in their manifestos. Both displayed the sonnenrad or ‘black sun’ symbol, which forms part of the AZOV battalion emblem. This simple linkage of itself does not prove much. But if we look from the other side it is clear that the AZOV group are active recruiters and facilitators of the white supremacist racism that is at the heart of the ideology they share.

“The nexus between far-right extremists in the United States and Ukraine” is a research paper prepared for the ‘Combatting Terrorism Center’ at West Point, the United States Military Academy. It states:

In recent years, some Americans and Europeans drawn to various brands of far-right nationalism have looked to Ukraine as their field of dreams: a country with a well-established, trained, and equipped far-right militia—the Azov Regiment—that has been actively engaged in the conflict against Russian-backed separatists in Donbass…. Far-right groups remain strong in Ukraine, with the ability to marshal thousands of supporters for protests and rallies, some of whom carry Nazi and white supremacist insignia.

Analysis of social media communications, court documents, travel histories, and other connections shows that a number of prominent individuals among far-right extremist groups in the United States and Europe have actively sought out relationships with representatives of the far-right in Ukraine, specifically the National Corps and its associated militia, the Azov Regiment. In some instances, as this article will show, U.S.-based individuals have spoken or written about how the training available in Ukraine might assist them and others in their paramilitary-style activities at home.

Another extensive report on the activities of the AZOV battalion is provided in the report ‘Mapping Militant Organizations. “AZOV Battalion.” from the Center for International Security and Co-operation at Stanford University. It also details the international ambitions and recruiting activites of the battalion, Interestingly in relation to its use of social media the report says:

In 2016, Facebook designated the Azov Battalion a “dangerous organization,” which allows it to regulate Azov content and deplatform Azov-related pages. In February 2022, Facebook’s parent company Meta announced that it would be temporarily loosening this designation to allow discussion of the Azov Battalion in the context of Ukrainian defense efforts. The ban still prohibited Azov from using Facebook for messaging, advertising, and recruiting.

The Soufan Center in a report titled ‘Intelbrief: The Transnational Network that Nobody is Talking About’ also describes the role played by the AZOV battalion in organising ultra-nationalist terrorism.

The Azov Battalion is emerging as a critical node in the transnational right-wing violent extremist (RWE) network. This group maintains its own ‘Western Outreach Office’ to help recruit and attract foreign fighters that travel to train and connect with people from like-minded violent organizations from across the globe. Operatives from the outreach office travel around Europe to promote the organization and proselytize its mission of white supremacy.

This report raises the possibility of a link between the Christchurch shooter and AZOV. There appears to be no direct evidence of this, although the Royal Commission report indicates that he did travel to Ukraine in 2015. However the Commission did indicate evidence of some connection with extreme right-wing groups in Ukraine:

The individual told his mother he would not renew the lease on his flat and wanted to sell his belongings and move to the Ukraine. That was the last time Sharon Tarrant and her partner saw the individual before the terrorist attack.

Sharon Tarrant later told Australian Federal Police that when she left New Zealand, she felt “petrified” about the individual’s mental health and increasingly racist views. She felt he had no friends and had isolated himself in a small, empty flat. She said that she was so worried that the night she left the individual, she searched online for information about white supremacy groups in Ukraine. She said that she emailed the individual an article about extreme right-wing groups in Ukraine that groomed young men like him and she pleaded for him to come home to Australia. He never responded.

It is highly likely that he agreed with it.

It would be to much to say that the total defeat of the AZOV battalion will signal the end of ultra-nationalist terrorism. Western media will no doubt do its best to minimise its significance as shown by the article sourced from the London Telegraph in today’s DomPost (not online). But our newly-enhanced security agencies  must take note of its significance, and be vigilant to watch for its next organised iteration.

 

 

128 comments on “The terrorist ‘heroes’ of Mariupol ”

  1. Francesca 1

    I wrote to Andrew Little over this very thing, just after Zelensky had put out the call that volunteer fighters would be welcome in Ukraine visa free.How would our intelligence agencies know where battle hardened returnees had been ?.I am quite sure that the GCSB are well aware of the Azov and the Tarrant connection. The infamous Biletsky, first commander of Azov was featured in the Guardian , training recruits at the beginning of the invasion .Azov foreign outreach is no secret…Azov has an international recruiting arm, but there are plenty other other militia, like Right Sector, whose former leader Dmitry Yarosh has been appointed advisor by Zelensky to the Chief Commandant of the Ukrainian army.Banderism is rife through the Ukrainian police, the SBU, and the regular army., and yet for purely political reasons in the west, this is trivialised .Absolutely criminal!

    And of course not a dicky bird from Little or his office

    • SPC 1.1

      a dicky bird. ​(British English, informal) to say, hear, etc. nothing. He won't say a dicky bird, but we think he knows who did it.

      (hypocoristic) A small bird. … (Britain, informal, from Cockney rhyming slang, used especially in negative constructions) A word; a small sound or thing.

      Dickie Bird

      English cricket umpire

      He gained a reputation for stopping play for weather, and almost never giving batsmen out LBW – he gave LBWs so seldom that if he did give it, there was absolutely no doubt the batsman was out.

  2. Sanctuary 2

    Mike Smith, trying hard to be a dollar store Epihaltes of Trachis.

    • SPC 2.1

      Ephialtes, it was probably because of him that for thousands of years people had to swear fealty.

      fealty

      /ˈfiːəlti/

      noun

      HISTORICAL

      1. a feudal tenant's or vassal's sworn loyalty to a lord.

        "they owed fealty to the Earl rather than the King"

        • formal acknowledgement of loyalty to a lord.

          "a property for which she did fealty"

      Thus the many Ephialtes, or Felicity's (sp), since then.

      The Pereiaslav Treaty of 1654 by the rada (council) of the Cossack army in Ukraine to submit Ukraine to Russian rule, and the acceptance of this act by emissaries of the Russian tsar Alexis; the agreement precipitated a war between Poland and Russia (1654–67).

      I’ve been waiting sometime to do, a Karen, on the coverage of, the Ukraine.

      PS Keri Russell (The Americans) once played the role of Felicity (Porter).

    • Populuxe1 2.2

      *Ephialtes, and I think it's more ideological blindness than anything sinister

  3. Cantabrian 3

    Well done to President Putin that well known defender of human rights.

    • Stuart Munro 3.1

      Yes – I'm not sure he doesn't have a dossier for instigating terrorism himself.

  4. RedLogix 4

    The ChCh shooter travelled to a number of countries – including Turkey and Pakistan. Because of the guilty plea and the closed trial there was never any public domain information available on how he became radicalised. Therefore everything in this post on this topic is pure speculation.

    As for what this person stated in his manifesto, because it illegal for New Zealanders to know what he said in his manifesto or at trial, anything said about his motivations is also pure speculation.

    As for the Azov Battalion, I can only relink to an actual expert in the topic. This obsession with a small handful of extremists who never had any political significance in Ukraine and long ceased any influence within the Azov Battalion is nothing but Kremlin denazification propaganda.

    As for Mike Smith – I know better than to type while retching.

    • Muttonbird 4.1

      I hope you have recovered from your short illness.

      Broadcasting the Australian mass murderer's rant is not going to help. He's not just asking questions, stupid.

      • RedLogix 4.1.1

        Because any knowledge about the ChCh shooter is illegal in New Zealand I think it is highly inappropriate for Mike Smith to make him the topic of a post at all.

        Anything anyone says about why he committed that crime is unable to be confirmed.

        • Muttonbird 4.1.1.1

          Not sure why it's important to publish the Australian's Mein Kamf in order for you to understand what happened and why.

          Far right wing culture warriors looking for excuses for atrocities is not the way forward.

      • roblogic 4.1.2

        There is some analysis of the manifesto on wikipedia. Copypasta replacement theory bullshit. Links to Azov are tenuous.

        Azov was formed to combat Russian separatists so of course it includes Ukrainian nationalists. By winning this battle, Putin no longer has justification for his war. So he should now leave.

        • RedLogix 4.1.2.1

          I don't live in New Zealand so different rules apply to me, but given the legal position it is still impossible to discuss his motives on a NZ based blog.

        • Populuxe1 4.1.2.2

          And if he leaves, there is no reason for Azov to continue to exist and they can go back to being thuggish football hooligans that the civilian police can deal with. And if the civilian police don't want to deal with it, the Ukraine government is going to have to if it wants to join the EU.

          That's the funny thing, all this strawmannism around Ukraine seething with Nazis misses the point that integration into the EU is very likely going to be a step in the right direction to address that.

          • adam 4.1.2.2.1

            These are not some football hooligans, they kill people, beat people up and smash property all in the name of white supremacy.

            Do you get how the far right work? These groups are working together to save the white race from the liberal LGBT west, and the Asian hordes. The only way they can do this in their minds is through violence. If you read below the Azov are the last group, violent extremists – THE true believers.

            https://christchurchattack.royalcommission.nz/the-report/part-2-context/harmful-behaviours-right-wing-extremism-and-radicalisation/

            • Populuxe1 4.1.2.2.1.1

              I said were, and clearly you have little knowledge of what the football Ultras get up to. Funnily enough, yes, I do get how people like the Christchurch shooter work. I'm not sure you do, because you've got this rather two-dimensional top-down idea about it when it's more like Da’esh – radicalised individuals who share ideology and may or may not occasionally gather but usually work alone, decentralised and random. Azov, on the other hand, are a much more old-fashioned outfit, more like the National Front, organised, hierarchical ethnonationalists with limited interest beyond their own borders, more like the IRA. No doubt they harbour some of the former, but guess what? We know. Russia basically handed them a reason to exist.

              • adam

                I disagree with you analysis.

                As it is how they operated 30 years ago. These groups have changed, and changed a lot. They are transnational, and not so nationalist as they once were. Yes the nationalist stuff is there, especially true if you look at the propaganda they spew.

                But peel it away, peel away the surface, and a far right white supremacy agenda is what you are left with. The Wolf Pack. It's not just street thugs who go to football games, these are well organised and funded groups – who are still small currently, but keep adding crisis upon crisis and who knows how big they will get.

                I agree the Muppet in Moscow handed these groups a golden ticket with the invasion. As such this should be put on the docket as another war crime the Russians have committed.

                • Populuxe1

                  And yet the international far right are as likely to be pro-Putanism as they are to be pro-Azov. More so, I should think. He actually offers them power and finance in a way that Azov simply doesn't.

                • mikesh

                  They are transnational, and not so nationalist as they once were. Yes the nationalist stuff is there, especially true if you look at the propaganda they spew.

                  Nationalist sentiment is something fascists can readily exploit.

              • mikesh

                They existed anyway. What do you think the skirmishes at the Donbas border, prior go the invasion, were all about.

                • Populuxe1

                  The pro-Kremlin insurgency backed by Russian neo-nazi entities like Wagner Group, Rusich, Russian National Unity, and the Russian Imperial Movement perhaps?

            • Stuart Munro 4.1.2.2.1.2

              These groups are working together to save the white race from the liberal LGBT west

              Okay, so Putin and Azov are allies? Or competitors? Putin blasts ‘cancel culture’ and diversity at Valdai Discussion Club – The Washington Post

        • Pierre 4.1.2.3

          According to Time magazine, Azov helped translate and distribute the Christchurch shooter's manifesto in Ukraine.

          An arm of the Azov movement helped distribute the terrorist’s raving manifesto, in print and online, seeking to glorify his crimes and inspire others to follow.

          Bellingcat has more on translation efforts here.

          I have not read the manifesto, not going to discuss its contents, but you have to wonder why Azov were keen to promote it.

          • Populuxe1 4.1.2.3.1

            Bellingcat goes to the effort of spelling out it was "an arm of the Azov movement" – even they aren't suggesting it was a coordinated movement by the whole. At no point has anyone suggested that Azov doesn't contain far right white supremacists. I mean, Army reservist linked to New Zealand far-right group | Stuff.co.nz

            • Pierre 4.1.2.3.1.1

              If the Christchurch shooter's manifesto was translated to Ukrainian in order to inspire volunteers to join Azov, what does that tell you about the political character of the group?

              • Populuxe1

                That they must be a lot smarter than me if they can get any coherent narrative out of it.

    • adam 4.2

      FFS RedLogix, the war crimes of this small group is worth talking about. Or are you going total Russophobe?

      To whitewash the Azov battalion is not helpful in any way. They might not have political power in a western liberal sense, as they simply did not care to. For them, they use violence as their political expression of choice, not elections, nor polls.

      It's not the 90's any more, these far right groups are without boarders, a GLOBAL WOLF PACK if you will. OK Maybe two wolf packs as their are neo-nazi groups fighting for the Russians, who hate the neo-nazi's in Ukraine. Personally I want all these far right groups to be put into a field with each other and wipe themselves out.

      These guys are as evil, warped, and as bent out of shape as the Oligarchs who run Russia. They are true believers, you have read the manifesto of the idiot from Christchurch. You know they believe the shit the talk about, and are willing to use violence to get their political message across.

      • RedLogix 4.2.1

        These days the term neo-nazi means any white person who speaks to patriotism or a sense of cultural identity. Like so many power laden, attack words the hard left stretches their meaning to the point they barely carry information any more.

        But given we have been told for several generations we have been loudly informed that white males are the source of all evil in the world – it is hardly surprising that a few might come to believe there are forces in the world who hate them and are seeking to replace them.

        • adam 4.2.1.1

          I'm using this definition

          https://www.britannica.com/dictionary/neo%E2%80%93Nazi

          So your bullshit straw man is a bit much.

          Do you believe in far right terrorism? Or are you a lone wolf kinda guy?

        • Populuxe1 4.2.1.2

          Oh what hyperbolic bollocks. There is an undoubtedly a neo-nazi element in Azov. The point is that in the grand scheme of things they are far less of a threat to Ukrainian liberal democracy than Russian missiles and tanks.

        • Pierre 4.2.1.3

          The fighters in the Volunteer Corps, Azov, Dnepr, Aidar, and Donbass Battalions may have a confused sense of cultural identity. They might have all sorts of insecurities about their whiteness or their masculinity. That's okay, but there are a lot of confused white men out there who manage to work through these issues without joining an ultranationalist militia.

          The black sun is a Nazi symbol. The black sun is part of the Azov logo, and it was also used by the Buffalo shooter. I would suggest that they wear this symbol primarily because they understand and support the political ideal it represents.

          It's true that the term neo-Nazi is overused, but I don't see the ambiguity here.

          • RedLogix 4.2.1.3.1

            They might have all sorts of insecurities about their whiteness or their masculinity.

            There you go – the immediate wookie reach to sneer at 'whiteness' and being a man. You will just love this:

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pexh6u5ZRss

            • Pierre 4.2.1.3.1.1

              You appear appear to have misunderstood my post. Who do you think I am sneering at? I reserve my contempt for the fascists and their poor sympathisers.

              • RedLogix

                You might want to reframe your first para then – it really didn't accurately convey your intention.

        • mikesh 4.2.1.4

          In essence, national socialism was a form of socialism which rejected Marx's internationalism. Although Hitler hated the Jews, the efforts of the brownshirts were directed mainly at the German communists.

  5. roblogic 5

    I take it that Mike Smith also feels the unilateral invasion and destruction of Iraq was justified because there was "proof" of WMDs

    • Muttonbird 5.1

      That said, it happened. Why would you deny another power that which the West has done?

      • Populuxe1 5.1.1

        I had no idea you and Saddam were so close. It must have been rough for you. Probably not as rough for all the people he tortured and killed though. Yes, the Iraq war was illegal and didn't achieve much, but neither am I going to cry crocodile tears over Saddam Hussein.

        • RedLogix 5.1.1.1

          Indeed. Some years back I wrote to a story I heard first hand from some who was a direct victim of Saddam's regime. I will not reveal the details here because they are so specific and sickening that it would necessarily violate their privacy.

          Suffice to say there were never any crocodile tears from me either.

          • Subliminal 5.1.1.1.1

            How absolutely hilarious. The ability to sanitise the Iraq war by the true believers through all the lies that were told is endless! Both Populux and Red are in accord. The illegal invasion of Iraq was justified and anyone who says otherwise is just a Saddam lover and hater of the free west! However, the destruction of the LDNR with 14000 civilian deaths between 2014 and 2022 by a military containing official neo-nazis including those installed in Mariupol to terrorise the local population into submission is just another equivilence to Madelaine Albrights half million dead Iraqui children. "We consider the price was worth it" Good to know we have such upstanding ideologists to determine the worthy from unworthy. Choosing between Falujah and Saddam? Personally, I think Saddam had more compassion

            • RedLogix 5.1.1.1.1.1

              How absolutely hilarious.

              Really – I gave you a hint as to the utterly sickening nature of the crimes the Saddam regime routinely inflicted. Yet you think they might be hilarious. Why am I not surprised?

              Like many in the West we protested and marched against the Iraq war at the time – because we understood it was going to be a very stupid and tragic mistake. Few however were marching to defend Saddam's regime.

              It is possible to hold both thoughts in your head at the same time.

              • Populuxe1

                I feel slightly ill.

                • RedLogix

                  There is an aphorism in geopolitics that goes – 'it was worse than a crime, it was a mistake'.

              • Subliminal

                And yet now you can whitewash that war as justified by Saddam being who he was rather than by Bush and everyone around him and supporting him being the monsters that they were on a preplanned mission of invasion that morphed from 9/11 when it became obvious that that line would be harder to construct a "narrative" around than outright lies about WMD.

                The death and destruction from this war makes any suffering wrought by Saddam pale into insignificance before even considering the terrible precedent created by "exceptional" America.

                The "rules" based world means subjugation to "exceptional" America. The rules don't apply to the exceptional. They are the exception. In a law based system there are no exceptions. There are only precedents. When a precedent is set its considerations apply to all. Iraq broke the system of international law that had already been seriously twisted by the bombing of Belgrade.

            • Populuxe1 5.1.1.1.1.2

              No one said it was justified, in fact I said it was illegal and didn't achieve much, but unlike some people I'm not enough of a hypocrite to pretend I am not delighted Saddam Hussein and his two loathsome sons were eradicated from the face of the earth.

              Personally, I think Saddam had more compassion

              This would be the Saddam with the r*pe dungeons in his palaces? The Saddam who committed genocide against the Marsh Arabs and the Kurds? The same Saddam that used to intimidate his underlings by suggesting his son Uday would love to meet their daughters? I suppose that would be if Uday had the time when not torturing the national football team for failing to place. That Saddam?

              • RedLogix

                with the r*pe dungeons in his palaces

                See my comment above at 5.1.1.1

                On a daily basis for more than a year, and that is only the smallest part of it. And Subsie here thinks it hilarious.

              • Subliminal

                The US has admitted to the use of white phosphorus in Falujah. Snipers were stationed so as to shoot anything that moved. This included veey old people and women with babies. Ambulances were blown up and health professionals in hospitals treating white phosphourous victims were threatened and then shot. Hundreds died in this inferno and this was but one theatre of the killing fields that Iraq became. Torture and rape were well documented events throughout the campaign. Quality of suffering is impossible to measure but on purely a numbers approach were compassion is measured on the quantity of death and destruction the US military will always have much to teach the likes of Saddam

                • Populuxe1

                  Congratulations. Your informal logical fallacy is Tu Quoque, otherwise known as Whataboutery: "attempting to discredit an opponent's position by charging hypocrisy without directly refuting or disproving the argument."

            • joe90 5.1.1.1.1.3

              Dude had people branded, hands, feet and ears amputated, opponents arbitrarily arrested, detained unlawfully, raped, tortured and murdered. Religious minorities persecuted and discriminated against, their property confiscated. Other minorities persecuted and discriminated against and entire regions of Iraq ethnically cleansed by mass deportations, rape and murder.

              More compassion, scum-bag left style.

              //

              .

      • weston 5.2.1

        Might have to watch the sunday one as well do you reckon red to get the whole context ?

        • RedLogix 5.2.1.1

          I realise Ukraine is an incredibly polarising issue – but Vlad Vexler feels like a trustworthy voice to my ear.

  6. aj 6

    Orwell's Ministry of Truth function was to re-write history and facts to serve war aims. The mainstream western media spent a decade calling the Azov Battalion neo-Nazi fanatics, yet now speak of them in admiring terms and suggest their Nazism is just a "Russian claim." Let's see what some peoples favourite source said about Azov as recently as 2018 / 2019:

    Ukrainian Far-Right Fighters, White Supremacists Trained by Major European Security Firm

    https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2018/08/30/ukrainian-far-right-fighters-white-supremacists-trained-major-european-security-firm/

    "Defend the White Race": American Extremists Being Co-Opted by Ukraine's Far-Right

    https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2019/02/15/defend-the-white-race-american-extremists-being-co-opted-by-ukraines-far-right/

    • Populuxe1 6.1

      yet now speak of them in admiring terms

      I'd like to see some actual evidence of that.

    • mikesh 6.2

      Orwell's Ministry of Truth was not so much directed at 'war aims" as maintaining Ingsoc's hold on power.

  7. Populuxe1 7

    So who in the mainstream are singing the unconditional praises of the Azov Battalion? That sounds like a straw person to me. Their beliefs are undesirable but they were little more than a gang of football hooligans prior to the Russian-backed crisis in Donbass and Luhansk. Although there are clearly Neo-Nazis in their ranks, as there undoubtedly are in our own military, post integration into the Ukrainian National Guard they do not appear to be explicitly or politically Neo-Nazi as a whole beyond the inherited imagery.

    Tablet Magazine, which definitely doesn't have any love for Nazis, says of them:

    It is indisputable that Azov was home to all sorts of nasty characters when it was first founded, and like many fighting forces (including America’s), it doubtless still contains some white supremacists, racists, and chauvinists today. But it is no longer a practically or ideologically racist organization, any more than the U.S. Army could still be called segregated after 1948.

    Why is Azov capitalised? It's literally a placename, not an acronym. Also perhaps Putin should start with de-Nazifying Russia before he starts invading other countries. The existence and influence of the Azov Battalion is almost entirely down to a reactionary response to Putin's machinations in the east. Otherwise all the far right political parties in Ukraine combined couldn't get enough votes for a seat in the Parliament. To be honest, if New Zealand were to be invaded and the National Front were fighting them on the beaches, I probably wouldn't be too picky either. Priorities and so forth.

    As for the Christchurch monster, not having seen the manifesto and like every other law abiding New Zealander being very unlikely to see the manifesto, I can't really comment, but it is known he went to India for three months as well. Are we to infer that he was also Hindu? The reality is, which should be obvious to anyone who thought about it for a few minutes and doesn't have an ideological wheelbarrow to push, that the internet means lots of unsavory people can radicalise each other with ideas, without necessarily having any other meaningful connection. It's a parasocial relationship at best.

    • adam 7.1

      Why are you whitewashing this group? They are not football hooligans.

      The main stream media – Well Facebook for starters. And also where have you been with the coverage of the Azovstal steel works? With the fighters in the plant with their neo-nazi insignia on display in almost ever news cast.

      Or the media doing as you are doing, down playing the fact they are a violent far right group operating within the Ukrainian army. Sure they may be small, not arguing against that. But I am going to point out they are not the liberal type you are use to to, nor do they play by the rules of law in any way. Violence is their politics, and the faster you learn that the better.

      • Populuxe1 7.1.1

        Why are you whitewashing this group? They are not football hooligans.

        I'm not. Never have. And they literally emerged from a gang of football Ultras associated with FC Metalist Kharkiv in 1982. Ironically in those days, before 2014, they were allied with their fellow racist hooligans in Russia supporting FC Spartak Moscow. You you actually have any idea of the kind of nationalist violence that goes with football? Clearly not, so probably not much of an expert on international white supremacism then. The insurgency in Kharkiv organised them far more effectively.

        Is it a more pressing issue than the wholesale slaughter of Ukrainian civilians by the Russian military machine?

        The main stream media – Well Facebook for starters. And also where have you been with the coverage of the Azovstal steel works? With the fighters in the plant with their neo-nazi insignia on display in almost ever news cast.

        Facebook is not the mainstream media. Facebook is full of crazies, trolls, idiots, and bots. Of course if Russia wasn't invading Ukraine there would be no media interest.

        Or the media doing as you are doing, down playing the fact they are a violent far right group operating within the Ukrainian army. Sure they may be small, not arguing against that. But I am going to point out they are not the liberal type you are use to to, nor do they play by the rules of law in any way. Violence is their politics, and the faster you learn that the better.

        The media don't usually name them. Putin is a far right element in charge of an entire country with nuclear weapons – that tends to worry me slightly more. As for any "liberal type" I may be used to, I've been active in hunting white supremacists in our politics for years. I've been threatened, intimidated, and know what a boot to the ribs feels like so kindly don't be condescending if it's all the same.

        • RedLogix 7.1.1.1

          Putin is a far right element in charge of an entire country with nuclear weapons – that tends to worry me slightly more.

          Which is why the far-left support for Putin here seems baffling – until you remember Horseshoe Theory.

          • adam 7.1.1.1.1

            Don't know any Anarcho-Communist, Syndicalists, or Christian Anarchists who think any authoritarian are worth supporting. Let alone have a hard on for Putin and his gaggle of war criminals.

            Who do you mean when you say far left Redlogix?

            • RedLogix 7.1.1.1.1.1

              Let alone have a hard on for Putin and his gaggle of war criminals.

              The author of the OP seems to tick that particular box. But again to be fair – not you.

          • In Vino 7.1.1.1.2

            For heaven's sake – I for one am well aware of Putin's megolomania and ruthless behaviour. But the minute anybody suggests that our side are guilty of anything at all, you speak of 'Putin supporters'.

            Are you on the side of the Ministry of Truth? Maybe your nom de plume should be BlueLogix rather than RedLogix? You aim your comment at the 'far-left', but to me it seems that you are demanding absolute adherence to the MSM line that Russia and Putin are totally evil, while we can have absolute trust in everything quoted from the Ukrainian propaganda machine, which seems to have the backing of our 5-eyes allies.

            So I guess I am now a far-left conspiracist?

            • RedLogix 7.1.1.1.2.1

              So I guess I am now a far-left conspiracist?

              To be fair – no. Not the same could be said of the OP author.

              it seems that you are demanding absolute adherence to the MSM line that Russia and Putin are totally evil, while we can have absolute trust in everything quoted from the Ukrainian propaganda machine

              Unlike almost everyone else here I have lived and worked in Russia twice – and I have written to those experiences here a number of times over the years. Nowhere have I characterised the Russian people as evil, quite the opposite.

              But there is no question this stupid, brutal invasion of Ukraine is utterly screwed up. I sincerely recommend this explanation:

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzja-LOqUd8

            • RedLogix 7.1.1.1.2.2

              Apologies I linked to the wrong clip above – I really intended this one which is closer to the point I wanted to make on cultural trauma:

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i3fuOfMZzY&

              • In Vino

                Thanks, RedLogix – interesting, and the guy arouses a lot of sympathy.

                Unfortunately, it still smacks of one-sided propaganda to me.

                eg – Every Russian bomb that is mentioned falls upon children, if not a children's hospital. It amazes me that the Russians can be so accurate in picking out the children. Laying it on a bit thick..

                • RedLogix

                  Given that it is Ukraine being invaded and Ukraine that faces being crushed by a neo-colonialist power which has explicitly denied their very existence – I would suggest they are allowed to tell their story as they see fit.

                  If nothing else this has to be the first YouTube war – an enormous amount of video material and analysis will inevitably present that side of the story that suits them. I think any intelligent person does keep this in mind.

                  • In Vino

                    That is why an intelligent person should be careful about taking any propaganda at all at face value. How many of the Russian atrocities are genuine?

                • Populuxe1

                  Well when you're firing and shelling into civilian populations, that does tend to be where children can be found. And actually yes there are a lot of large children's hospitals in Ukraine – legacy of Soviet infrastructure and all that. Okhmatdyt Children's Hospital is a large and obvious target in Kyiv.

                  • In Vino

                    Especially if nasty Ukrainian troops have started using the top storey for firing weapons, making the hospital a human shield.

                    We cannot know the truth, and that is our problem.

          • mikesh 7.1.1.1.3

            Whatever one may think of Putin, he's a vast improvement on his drunken predecessor. Putin has said that the Soviet collapse was the worst disaster that had ever happened to Russia. However, it was not the collapse itself that was the problem – communism was no great loss – but rather the events that followed. Things may have been different if Putin had been able to take over immediately.

            • RedLogix 7.1.1.1.3.1

              Whatever one may think of Putin, he's a vast improvement on his drunken predecessor.

              The truly tragic thing is that Putin is a vast improvement of all of his predecessors for several hundred years. Yet here we are.

              • In Vino

                There I almost agree – Russia has a culture and history of thriving only when it is ruled by a cruel despot, with a rod of iron. I agree with historians who call Stalin the latest of the great Tsars: the socialist/communist experiment stood little chance in Russia with Stalin around in such a culture. I think Putin is trying to be the next great Tsar, and I am neither surprised nor shocked by his brutal methods. But I have similar doubts about the Ukrainians, and suspect that the USA has been quietly stirring this up for a long time. (And we know what angels they are…)

        • adam 7.1.1.2

          Come on, facebook is where many people get their news, you might not like it, but it's the reality for substantial section of our society.

          Ha, I was sucker punched by a far right loony at a football match, so I know how crazy that shit can be. Also been stab by Serbian skin head protecting a immigrant family. So in the same boat. Why I got a bit pissed off at your comments. So for the condescending shitfuckry I appolgise.

          As for Putin, and the Oligarch who run Russia, nuclear armed totalitarians are always a threat, and like all totalitarians – scum.

    • Subliminal 7.2

      You seem to be forgetting the Odessa massacre in March 2014. The deliberate burning to death of 48 citizens of Ukraine in the Trade Union Hall.

      Right Sector leader Dmytro Yarosh told Newsweek on March 19th that the Western-backed coup regime in Kiev has organized Right Sector militia members into new paramilitary forces for a "war" to "cleanse the country" of pro-Russian protesters. So it is not clear whether the militiamen responsible for the mass murder in Odessa were in fact newly recruited Ukrainian "National Guard" troops or just "civilian" Right Sector thugs, nor whether they were locals from Odessa or forces sent in from Kiev, Lviv or elsewhere in Western Ukraine.

      For a fuller round up of this and other extreme violence, here or here

      48 citizens of Ukraine brutally murdered by burning with no investigation nor attempt to aprehend the culprits?? What does that say for these actions other than that they were accepted and condoned by the newly chosen Ukraine dictatorship, chosen by Victoria Newland, who is currently again in charge of the US Ukraine file under Biden?

      Given this level of ability to influence political, judicial and military, it is irrelevant as to the absolute numbers of far right parliamentarians. They have demonstrated their absolute ability to dictate the future path of the new illegitimate regime. The shelling and killing of citizens in the Donbass and the massive increase in this shelling, prior to the Russian recognition of the LDNR in Feb, which led to an attempt at total evacuation of the civilian population from these shelled regions, shows the continued oversized dominance of the far right and their obsession to "cleanse" Ukraine of Russian speaking citizens.

      Your characterisation of Azov as "football hooligans" is a joke of the same order as Albrights sacrificial half million Iraqi children.

      • Populuxe1 7.2.1

        Yes, they're criminals. Have you seen what the Head Hunters get up to here? Or do you only care about violent organised crime when it fits into your ideological box?

        • Subliminal 7.2.1.1

          Do you ever read what others say?? Perhaps you could point out where it is that the Headhunterh have gained any control of any national or even provincial institutions or that the state or province condones or supports their violence??

          • Populuxe1 7.2.1.1.1

            Admittedly I do try to limit my reading of blatant apologism because it tends to interfere with my digestion. Either you gravely underestimate the reach of the Head Hunters in this country or you're woefully overestimating how much of a threat the Azov Battalion is to Ukraine.

            • Subliminal 7.2.1.1.1.1

              Right. So no state sponsored legitimacy then. Headhunters that burned 48 people to their death could be assured of members of the local constabulary knocking on their doors and asking questions and also of being refused any request to form a battalion in the NZ defence force and further visits by the constabulary if making credible threats against the PM or demands that speakers of a nationally recognised language be cleansed from the population

              • Populuxe1

                You know, I genuinely am more worried by a the war itself than your need to go hunting for Nazis under beds.

        • Pierre 7.2.1.2

          My advice when far-right thugs come to your neighbourhood, it's important to get organised and support the local antifa.

          Russian antifa

      • aj 7.2.2

        A five-minute read on the background of Azov. Believe or disbelieve as you will, the verifiable facts seem ok and the rest are opinions.

        A thread on “Azov”. A lot of people are talking about them these days, the New York Times & the Pope call on them to be saved, they are being presented as glorious heroes. So, let's take a short look at their history:

        The roots of “Azov” can be found in the Neonazi soccer hooligan scene of Kharkov. Andrei Biletsky was the central figure of the nascent movement for the longest time. A Kharkov native, he joined numerous nationalist organizations, e.g. the Lvov-based “Tryzub”.

        https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1528023220225466374.html

  8. barry 8

    "liberation of the Russian-speaking territories in eastern Ukraine"

    FFS – you can discuss the far-right in Azov without repeating Russian bullshit.

    They have not "liberated" Mariupol, they have flattened it. It reminds me of the American "we had to destroy the village to save it" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Arnett

    The Azov battalion would never have gained the strength or the political cover in Ukraine, if it had not been for Russian aggression in the East. It is like Afghanistan and Al Qaeda. War and destabilisation give room of extremist movements to grow.

    Russia is doing much more to fuel extremism than fighting it.

    • Francesca 8.1

      The precursors of Azov were formed way before the violent sacking of the Ukraine parliament in 2014.Biletsky, the infamous Biletsky formed Patriot of Ukraine way back in 2005

      The unit was initially formed as a volunteer group in May 2014 out of the ultra-nationalist Patriot of Ukraine gang, and the neo-Nazi Social National Assembly (SNA) group. Both groups engaged in xenophobic and neo-Nazi ideals and physically assaulted migrants, the Roma community and people opposing their views.

      The underlying ideology was well established before 2014, so sorry, you can't blame the eastern provinces for that .Like blaming the jews for the nazis

    • weston 8.2

      Whateva Barry seems to me there's far more bullshit coming out of Kyiv than Russia and Mariupol has hosted the Azov's as very unwelcome guests for far too long according to the bulk of the residents living there .

      Neither has Mariupol been" flattened" despite very fierce fighting and will doubtless be being rebuilt as we speak .

      Russia views the rabble of mercenaries volunteers ex crims far right extremists posing as regular ukrainian military as just that a rabble and having recognized the breakaway regions of the donbass will live up to the expectations of those populaces in removing them by the looks of it .Eight years is a long time to live at the point of a gun and imo peace and security for these regions is at long last in sight .

      Imo the goverment of Zelensky and his oligarch backers has been an absolute and unmitigated disaster for ukraine and their total failure to implement the Minsk agreement just one highlight of a dismal divisory performance the cost of which ukraine will probably be paying for a very long time indeed .

      • RedLogix 8.2.1

        Russia views the rabble of mercenaries

        Given that Putin has so far refused to declare this special operation a war – technically every Russian soldier in Ukraine is at this moment a mercenary.

        • In Vino 8.2.1.1

          Mercenaries do not inherently belong to one specific army like the Russian soldiers involved – the hire themselves out temporarily to any old cause. I would say there are soldiers on both sides. And maybe some mercenaries involved on either side.

          • RedLogix 8.2.1.1.1

            My point is – that every Russian soldier in Ukraine is being paid to fight in another country that their country is not at war with. Pretty much the definition of a mercenary.

      • joe90 8.2.2

        the rabble of mercenaries

        Like this dude with the SS collar tab tattoos?

    • mikesh 8.3

      They have not "liberated" Mariupol, they have flattened it.

      True. A territory can't be "liberated", only a people. However, that seems to miss the point.

  9. lprent 9

    Getting excited by a far-right political movement that had less then 0.5% in the most recent election in Ukraine, and minimal support in any part of government since 2017 – well it is good for conspiracy theorists and the Russian equivalent of Fox.

    We probably have similar support for at-right ideology in NZ. But it is simply too small to be a serious problem. I'm getting tired of people raising this as a serious issue because I have looked at it, after it got raised and found no evidence of anything worth more than a watching brief by intelligence and security forces. The same as I hope has happened here since Christchurch.

    I find it irrelevant to the world as a whole and the people claiming it as being important as being suckers for stupid propaganda. This post and its comments adds nothing to that argument.

    What I find relevant to the world is a state that is started a undeclared war by launching an invasion on a neighbouring state, and threatening their usage of nuclear weapons for any state that interferes with their attack.

    They have justified their attack using great power language that comes directly from the 19th century, ethnic cleansing language that comes straight out of the Balkans, and a logic about NATO and the EU that completely ignores the clear intent of the populations in other nations that voluntarily entered those alliances. None of which should have any relevance for anyone with any brains in the 21st century.

    All of those arguments has caused immense wars over the last 3 centuries and only deserve to be dumped in the dustbin of history.

    To support this, the Russian Federation has added measures against internal dissent that remind me of the pre-war Nazi clampdowns in the 1930s. The actions of their troops in occupied territories remind me of the SS and Gestapo extermination campaigns against civilians in Eastern Europe in the 1940s. This being reported by a reasonably unconstrained free international press and bodies concerned with war crimes.

    If Mike wants to look for Nazi like activity, then I'd suggest that he should start looking at current events, and start putting less weight on a political grouping in the Ukraine that is about a 10th of the vote as One Nation in aussie, and a possible military group that is even smaller in Ukrainian armed force than their political impact.

    • RedLogix 9.1

      Rational, balanced and much appreciated. yes

    • mikesh 9.2

      Electoral support is often irrelevant. One only has to look at various military coups in South America to realise that. Azov doesn’t appear to be the only fascist group in Ukraine.

      • Populuxe1 9.2.1

        It still doesn't mean they can't hold their national conference in a cupboard.
        As Paul Spoonley could no doubt tell you, we have the National Front, Dobson's Pledge, Wargus Christi, the White nationalist Dominion Movement, and Action Zealandia. Does that entitle Russia to invade us as well?

      • lprent 9.2.2

        The military coups require widespread support inside the military and even in the population . Military coups don't happen in a vacuum (like inside of your head appears to be), they happen when their are large amounts of support inside a military organisation and inside their host population. There isn't any evidence of that.

        If you aren't the complete fool, then you'll lookup the pre-war size of the worst possible case.

        What is the size of the Azov brigade and what is the size of the rest of standing army? At best it is only a few percent of the standing armed forces of Ukraine. How exactly does a minnow swallow an elephant – when the elephant has most of the weapons.

        There is no particular evidence (outside of the fevered conspiracy theories of demented fear-mongers) that the rest of the military in Ukraine contains more than the usual proportion of alt-right nutbars. Those exist in every military or para-military organisation (like our police) world wide.

        The reality is that this teeny part of the Ukrainian population and military has been pumped up as some kind of daft bogeyman. Primarily for the benefit and by the Russian propaganda.

        In my view that was mostly because it was a way of explaining why the Russian subservient wannabe breakaway states were unable to make any headway in their stated objectives after their initial surprise in 2014. That was despite the high levels of support given from the Russian military in their undeclared war against Ukraine.

        I haven't seen anyone manage to make a case for it being credible in realistic way. We just get a lot of knee quivering waffle with about as much useful detail as this post and commentary.

  10. UncookedSelachimorpha 10

    I find this post despicable – spewing Russian propaganda while the Russians comit unspeakable crimes and rape, murder and destroy. Garbage from a brutal regime that considers Facebook, Instagram, Twitter to be extremist sources.

    Here is another view on Azov from the Centre for Civil Liberties:

    There are no units created based on ideology among Ukrainian National Guard, nor are there any among the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

    The only possible ideology of any unit of the National Guard of Ukraine is the Disciplinary Statute. Among other rules, it states the obligation to “respect human rights, honor and dignity” and “refrain from expressions and actions which can violate human rights or humiliate honor and dignity of a person”.

    There are people of different ethnic origins – Russians, Jews, Crimean Tatars among others, of various religious views and political affiliations. There is no limitation on who could be part of it. According to the unit’s officers, the majority of the personnel are Russian-speaking.

    “We despise Nazism and Stalinism”, – is stated in one of the last posts on the official Telegram channel of the unit (from March 28). By the way, it is stated in Russian.

  11. UncookedSelachimorpha 11

    Seven popular myths about Russia's aggression against Ukraine

    This includes discussion of the "Azov Nazi" lies coming from Russia.

  12. thebiggestfish7 12

    You are nothing short of a Russian war apologist. Disgraceful.

  13. Janet 13

    What I find relevant to the world is a state that is started a undeclared war by launching an invasion on a neighbouring state, and threatening their usage of nuclear weapons for any state that interferes with their attack.”

    As I see it too and when you consider, as they say, Putin has quite a strong Christian faith

    Thou shalt not kill. …

    You shall not covet your neighbour's house…….or anything that is your neighbour’s.
    Thou shalt not steal.

    Thou shall not bear false witness.

    Yeah right ! Rotten Putin, rotten Russia

  14. UncookedSelachimorpha 14

    An article examining the history of the Azov battilion, as they developed from their initial far-right origins. Much more nuanced view than the Russian propaganda of the original post.

    Branding the Azov Battalion as ‘neo-Nazi’ long after it shed its far-right origins is part of a deafening corruption of public discourse

  15. Well done, Mike, for keeping your head while all around are losing theirs. The mounting evidence on Azov et al deserves more than flaccid "conspiracy theory" accusations.

    Let's see how this looks in a few years. Western MSM views on the issue have certainly been subjected to revision by the Ministry of Truth.

    lprent, you diminish the issue with low voting figures. Are you suggesting that there are not whole neo-Nazi battalions, no serious infiltration of the Interior Ministry and Police, and that Mariupol has been administered since 2015 by the regular Urainian Army?

    • Gosman 15.1

      Are you stating the Russian military is not also employing far-right militias in the fgight in Ukraine?

  16. Gosman 17

    While elements of the Azov battalion are definately unpleasant and far-right in nature the ideology has been watered down since it founding back in 2014. On top of that is the fact that many of the militias it is fighting against from the Russian controlled Donbas region also share far-right ideas and have neo-Nazi symbolism associated with them.

    https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-fighter-neo-nazi-symbols-medal-kill-ukraine-nationalist-2022-4

  17. One soldier is not evidence of structural incorporation of neo-Nazi elements, Gosman.

  18. AB 19

    Do military forces defending a nation's borders need to undergo ideological purity tests to determine if that defence is justified?

    Probably a bad idea – because no self-defence would ever be justified. History, as TS Eliot suggested in 'Gerontion', has many 'contrived corridors' and 'supple confusions'.

  19. aj 20

    This is almost 'off-topic' – two important articles in relation to the issues around this conflict in general, and not the narrow discussion about Azov in this thread above.

    Both writers are experts in their fields. I doubt reading these will liquify any of the frozen solid opinions expressed in this debate but there is value in presenting them and trying to understand as best we can the wider issues involved in this, the most vital and terrifying malfunction in diplomacy in our time.

    Richard Falk (an American professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University) makes many thought-provoking points in this article and his dissection of the 'Right to Veto' in the UN is particularly interesting.

    Such an observation makes us aware that there exists not one source of normative authority in international but at least two. There is the fundamental idea deriving from the origins of the modern states system identified with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which accorded equality to sovereign states. And then there is a second source of largely unwritten normative authority that regulates those few states that are freed from the constraints of international law and enjoy impunity for their actions. These are the states given the veto power, and among these states are those that seek the added discretion of being non-accountable for their acts.

    Westphalian Logic and Geopolitical Prudence in the Nuclear Age.

    The fog of war has been replaced by a war fever while making the transition from helping Ukraine defend itself against aggression to pursuing a victory over Russia increasingly heedless of nuclear dangers and worldwide economic dislocations that threatened many millions with famine, acute insecurity, and destitution.

    In the context of the Ukraine War Russia is to be faulted for its flagrant violation of the prohibition of aggressive war and its war crimes in Ukrainian combat zones, and for intimating a willingness to have recourse to nuclear weapons if its vital interests are threatened. The United States is to be faulted for irresponsible statecraft or imprudent geopolitics by its replacement of a defensive role of support of Ukrainian resistance by pushing for the defeat of Russia through the massive increase of aid, encouragement of enlarged Ukrainian goals, supplying offensive weaponry, continuation of demonizing Putin, absence of advocacy of ceasefire and peace diplomacy, inattentiveness to escalation risks especially in relation to nuclear dangers, and overall manipulation of Ukraine Crisis as part of its strategic commitment to the sort of unipolar geopolitics that has emerged during the aftermath of the Cold War, which entails a repudiation of Chinese and Russian efforts to replace unipolarity with multipolarity. It is this latter tension that if not addressed points to Cold War II, feverish arms races, periodic crises, and diversion of resources and energies from such urgent global challenges as climate change, food security, and humane migration policies.

    https://www.radiofree.org/2022/05/20/westphalian-logic-and-geopolitical-prudence-in-the-nuclear-age/

    Stephen Cohen was recognised as the pre-eminent American scholar of Russian studies. His academic work concentrated on modern Russian history since the Bolshevik Revolution and Russia's relationship with the United States.

    Taking Aim at Criminalizing Russia: Stephen Cohen Challenges A Rampant Mania

    Cohen urges us to really face up to Russia’s status in the geopolitical world. Russia remains the “largest territorial country in the world. It possesses a disproportionate share of the planet’s natural resources, from energy, iron ore, nickel, timber, diamonds, and gold to fresh water. It is also squarely between East and West, whose civilizations are in conflict, and part of both. Months ago I raised the possibility that Russia might ‘leave the West,’ driven out by the new Cold War or by choice. The possibility is now said by a top Kremlin aide and ideologist to be inescapable”. It certainly seems to me (four years after he wrote these words), that US/EU/NATO is forcing Russia out of the Euro-security zone. Russia desires to “protect its own borders” and has not expanded towards American borders.

    Here we have it – “sanctioned, criminal Russia is ‘isolated from the international community’” – a western media conceit. “’Putin’s Russia’ and non-Western countries such as China, Iran, India, and other BRIC nations are thriving. And it is there that most of the world’s territory, people, resources, and growing markets are located. For them, Russia is not criminal but an eagerly sought partner”. Cohen reminds, as well, that there is “military parity” between the US and Russia: the “road to American national security runs through Moscow.” But, alas, “This necessity may now seem futile, as US political-media elites mindlessly criminalize Russia”. This wounded and beautiful and powerful country does not need criminalization.

    https://www.counterpunch.org/2022/05/20/taking-aim-at-criminalizing-russia-stephen-cohen-challenges-a-rampant-mania/

  20. Jenny how to get there 21

    The people of Ukraine know who the real "Terrorists" are.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgmKygmkqSA

  21. Jenny how to get there 22

    The people of Syria know who the real terrorists are, they are the same terrorists that Putin has been recruiting to help in his invasion and occupation of Ukraine.

    Hundreds of Syrian civilians. men women and children were killed by Russian bombing raids on Aleppo. Followed up by Assad's mopping up terror groups.

    Except for a few deluded cranks, the whole world knows who the real fascists and terrorists are.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J1gqCp6C0s

  22. rightofcentre 23

    Im impressed with that article.

    That is the most honest writeup I have seen written in NZ in regards to Ukraine

    It makes me happy to see not all leftys are walking in lockstep and some still have the intellect to see through the bullshit

  23. Mike the Lefty 24

    I suppose it is a question of ethics and morality.

    When we look at the neo-Nazi Azov defenders and the civilian-murdering Russian invaders who do we judge as the better?

    In the end it doesn't matter whether they are hard-line Nazi, hard-line Stalinist or just plain hard-line. They all believe in the same things – domination, exploitation of humankind and they all use the same methods – intimidation and violence.

    Each is worse than the other.

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    Depictions of Islam in Western popular culture have rarely been positive, even before 9/11. Five years on from the mosque shootings, this is one of the cultural headwinds that the Muslim community has to battle against. Whatever messages of tolerance and inclusion are offered in daylight, much of our culture ...
    1 day ago
  • New Rail Operations Centre Promises Better Train Services
    Last week Transport Minster Simeon Brown and Mayor Wayne Brown opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre. The new train control centre will see teams from KiwiRail, Auckland Transport and Auckland One Rail working more closely together to improve train services across the city. The Auckland Rail Operations Centre in ...
    1 day ago
  • Bernard's six newsy things at 6.36am on Monday, March 18
    Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson said in an exit interview with Q+A yesterday the Government can and should sustain more debt to invest in infrastructure for future generations. Elsewhere in the news in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy at 6:36am: Read more ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 day ago
  • Geoffrey Miller: Wang Yi’s perfectly-timed, Aukus-themed visit to New Zealand
    Timing is everything. And from China’s perspective, this week’s visit by its foreign minister to New Zealand could be coming at just the right moment. The visit by Wang Yi to Wellington will be his first since 2017. Anniversaries are important to Beijing. It is more than just a happy ...
    Democracy ProjectBy Geoffrey Miller
    1 day ago
  • The Kaka’s diary for the week to March 25 and beyond
    TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to March 18 include:China’s Foreign Minister visiting Wellington today;A post-cabinet news conference this afternoon; the resumption of Parliament on Tuesday for two weeks before Easter;retiring former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson gives his valedictory speech in Parliament; ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    1 day ago
  • Bitter and angry; Winston First
    New Zealand First Leader Winston Peters’s state-of-the-nation speech on Sunday was really a state-of-Winston-First speech. He barely mentioned any of the Government’s key policies and could not even wholly endorse its signature income tax cuts. Instead, he rehearsed all of his complaints about the Ardern Government, including an extraordinary claim ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    2 days ago
  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #11
    A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
    2 days ago
  • 2024 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #11
    A listing of 35 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 10, 2024 thru Sat, March 16, 2024. Story of the week This week we'll give you a little glimpse into how we collect links to share and ...
    2 days ago
  • Out of Touch.
    “I’ve been internalising a really complicated situation in my head.”When they kept telling us we should wait until we get to know him, were they taking the piss? Was it a case of, if you think this is bad, wait till you get to know the real Christopher, after the ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • Bring out your Dad
    Happy fourth anniversary, Pandemic That Upended Bloody Everything. I have been observing it by enjoying my second bout of COVID. It’s 5.30 on Sunday morning and only now are lights turning back on for me.Allow me to copy and paste what I told reader Sara yesterday:Depleted, fogged and crappy. Resting, ...
    More Than A FeildingBy David Slack
    2 days ago
  • The bewildering world of Chris Luxon – Guns for all, not no lunch for kids
    .“$10 and a target that bleeds” - Bleeding Targets for Under $10!.Thanks for reading Frankly Speaking ! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.This government appears hell-bent on either scrapping life-saving legislation or reintroducing things that - frustrated critics insist - will be dangerous and likely ...
    Frankly SpeakingBy Frank Macskasy
    3 days ago
  • Expert Opinion: Ageing Boomers, Laurie & Les, Talk Politics.
    It hardly strikes me as fair to criticise a government for doing exactly what it said it was going to do. For actually keeping its promises.”THUNDER WAS PLAYING TAG with lightning flashes amongst the distant peaks. Its rolling cadences interrupted by the here-I-come-here-I-go Doppler effect of the occasional passing car. ...
    3 days ago
  • Manufacturing The Truth.
    Subversive & Disruptive Technologies: Just as happened with that other great regulator of the masses, the Medieval Church, the advent of a new and hard-to-control technology – the Internet –  is weakening the ties that bind. Then, and now, those who enjoy a monopoly on the dissemination of lies, cannot and will ...
    3 days ago
  • A Powerful Sensation of Déjà Vu.
    Been Here Before: To find the precedents for what this Coalition Government is proposing, it is necessary to return to the “glory days” of Muldoonism.THE COALITION GOVERNMENT has celebrated its first 100 days in office by checking-off the last of its listed commitments. It remains, however, an angry government. It ...
    3 days ago
  • Can you guess where world attention is focussed (according to Greenpeace)? It’s focussed on an EPA...
    Bob Edlin writes –  And what is the world watching today…? The email newsletter from Associated Press which landed in our mailbox early this morning advised: In the news today: The father of a school shooter has been found guilty of involuntary manslaughter; prosecutors in Trump’s hush-money case ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    3 days ago
  • Further integrity problems for the Greens in suspending MP Darleen Tana
    Bryce Edwards writes – Is another Green MP on their way out? And are the Greens severely tarnished by another integrity scandal? For the second time in three months, the Green Party has secretly suspended an MP over integrity issues. Mystery is surrounding the party’s decision to ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    3 days ago
  • Jacqui Van Der Kaay: Greens’ transparency missing in action
    For the last few years, the Green Party has been the party that has managed to avoid the plague of multiple scandals that have beleaguered other political parties. It appears that their luck has run out with a second scandal which, unfortunately for them, coincided with Golraz Ghahraman, the focus ...
    Democracy ProjectBy bryce.edwards
    3 days ago
  • Bernard’s Dawn Chorus with six newsey things at 6:46am for Saturday, March 16
    TL;DR: The six newsey things that stood out to me as of 6:46am on Saturday, March 16.Andy Foster has accidentally allowed a Labour/Green amendment to cut road user chargers for plug-in hybrid vehicles, which the Government might accept; NZ Herald Thomas Coughlan Simeon Brown has rejected a plea from Westport ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    3 days ago
  • How Did FTX Crash?
    What seemed a booming success a couple of years ago has collapsed into fraud convictions.I looked at the crash of FTX (short for ‘Futures Exchange’) in November 2022 to see whether it would impact on the financial system as a whole. Fortunately there was barely a ripple, probably because it ...
    PunditBy Brian Easton
    4 days ago
  • Elections in Russia and Ukraine
    Anybody following the situation in Ukraine and Russia would probably have been amused by a recent Tweet on X NATO seems to be putting in an awful lot of effort to influence what is, at least according to them, a sham election in an autocracy.When do the Ukrainians go to ...
    4 days ago
  • Bernard’s six stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15
    TL;DR: Shaun Baker on Wynyard Quarter's transformation. Magdalene Taylor on the problem with smart phones. How private equity are now all over reinsurance. Dylan Cleaver on rugby and CTE. Emily Atkin on ‘Big Meat’ looking like ‘Big Oil’.Bernard’s six-stack of substacks at 6pm on March 15Photo by Jeppe Hove Jensen ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Buzz from the Beehive Finance Minister Nicola Willis had plenty to say when addressing the Auckland Business Chamber on the economic growth that (she tells us) is flagging more than we thought. But the government intends to put new life into it:  We want our country to be a ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    4 days ago
  • National’s clean car tax advances
    The Transport and Infrastructure Committee has reported back on the Road User Charges (Light Electric RUC Vehicles) Amendment Bill, basicly rubberstamping it. While there was widespread support among submitters for the principle that EV and PHEV drivers should pay their fair share for the roads, they also overwhelmingly disagreed with ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    4 days ago
  • Government funding bailouts
    Peter Dunne writes – This week’s government bailout – the fifth in the last eighteen months – of the financially troubled Ruapehu Alpine Lifts company would have pleased many in the central North Island ski industry. The government’s stated rationale for the $7 million funding was that it ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • Two offenders, different treatments.
    See if you can spot the difference. An Iranian born female MP from a progressive party is accused of serial shoplifting. Her name is leaked to the media, which goes into a pack frenzy even before the Police launch an … Continue reading ...
    KiwipoliticoBy Pablo
    4 days ago
  • Treaty references omitted
    Ele Ludemann writes  – The government is omitting general Treaty references from legislation : The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last Government in a bid to get greater coherence in the public service on Treaty ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • The Ghahraman Conflict
    What was that judge thinking? Peter Williams writes –  That Golriz Ghahraman and District Court Judge Maria Pecotic were once lawyer colleagues is incontrovertible. There is published evidence that they took at least one case to the Court of Appeal together. There was a report on ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    4 days ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' for March 15
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Climate Scorpion – the sting is in the tail. Introducing planetary solvency. A paper via the University of Exeter’s Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.Local scoop: Kāinga Ora starts pulling out of its Auckland projects and selling land RNZ ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • The day Wellington up-zoned its future
    Wellington’s massively upzoned District Plan adds the opportunity for tens of thousands of new homes not just in the central city (such as these Webb St new builds) but also close to the CBD and public transport links. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: Wellington gave itself the chance of ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    4 days ago
  • Weekly Roundup 15-March-2024
    It’s Friday and we’re halfway through March Madness. Here’s some of the things that caught our attention this week. This Week in Greater Auckland On Monday Matt asked how we can get better event trains and an option for grade separating Morningside Dr. On Tuesday Matt looked into ...
    Greater AucklandBy Greater Auckland
    4 days ago
  • That Word.
    Something you might not know about me is that I’m quite a stubborn person. No, really. I don’t much care for criticism I think’s unfair or that I disagree with. Few of us do I suppose.Back when I was a drinker I’d sometimes respond defensively, even angrily. There are things ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    4 days ago
  • The Hoon around the week to March 15
    Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:PM Christopher Luxon said the reversal of interest deductibility for landlords was done to help renters, who ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • Labour’s policy gap
    It was not so much the Labour Party but really the Chris Hipkins party yesterday at Labour’s caucus retreat in Martinborough. The former Prime Minister was more or less consistent on wealth tax, which he was at best equivocal about, and social insurance, which he was not willing to revisit. ...
    PolitikBy Richard Harman
    5 days ago
  • Skeptical Science New Research for Week #11 2024
    Open access notables A Glimpse into the Future: The 2023 Ocean Temperature and Sea Ice Extremes in the Context of Longer-Term Climate Change, Kuhlbrodt et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society: In the year 2023, we have seen extraordinary extrema in high sea surface temperature (SST) in the North Atlantic and in ...
    5 days ago
  • Melissa remains mute on media matters but has something to say (at a sporting event) about economic ...
     Buzz from the Beehive   The text reproduced above appears on a page which records all the media statements and speeches posted on the government’s official website by Melissa Lee as Minister of Media and Communications and/or by Jenny Marcroft, her Parliamentary Under-secretary.  It can be quickly analysed ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    5 days ago
  • The return of Muldoon
    For forty years, Robert Muldoon has been a dirty word in our politics. His style of government was so repulsive and authoritarian that the backlash to it helped set and entrench our constitutional norms. His pig-headedness over forcing through Think Big eventually gave us the RMA, with its participation and ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    5 days ago
  • Will the rental tax cut improve life for renters or landlords?
    Bryce Edwards writes –  Is the new government reducing tax on rental properties to benefit landlords or to cut the cost of rents? That’s the big question this week, after Associate Finance Minister David Seymour announced on Sunday that the Government would be reversing the Labour Government’s removal ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • Geoffrey Miller: What Saudi Arabia’s rapid changes mean for New Zealand
    Saudi Arabia is rarely far from the international spotlight. The war in Gaza has brought new scrutiny to Saudi plans to normalise relations with Israel, while the fifth anniversary of the controversial killing of Jamal Khashoggi was marked shortly before the war began on October 7. And as the home ...
    Democracy ProjectBy Geoffrey Miller
    5 days ago
  • Racism’s double standards
    Questions need to be asked on both sides of the world Peter Williams writes –   The NRL Judiciary hands down an eight week suspension to Sydney Roosters forward Spencer Leniu , an Auckland-born Samoan, after he calls Ezra Mam, Sydney-orn but of Aboriginal and Torres Strait ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • It’s not a tax break
    Ele Ludemann writes – Contrary to what many headlines and news stories are saying, residential landlords are not getting a tax break. The government is simply restoring to them the tax deductibility of interest they had until the previous government removed it. There is no logical reason ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • The Plastic Pig Collective and Chris' Imaginary Friends.
    I can't remember when it was goodMoments of happiness in bloomMaybe I just misunderstoodAll of the love we left behindWatching our flashbacks intertwineMemories I will never findIn spite of whatever you becomeForget that reckless thing turned onI think our lives have just begunI think our lives have just begunDoes anyone ...
    Nick’s KōreroBy Nick Rockel
    5 days ago
  • Who is responsible for young offenders?
    Michael Bassett writes – At first reading, a front-page story in the New Zealand Herald on 13 March was bizarre. A group of severely intellectually limited teenagers, with little understanding of the law, have been pleading to the Justice Select Committee not to pass a bill dealing with ram ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    5 days ago
  • Gordon Campbell on National’s fantasy trip to La La Landlord Land
    How much political capital is Christopher Luxon willing to burn through in order to deliver his $2.9 billion gift to landlords? Evidently, Luxon is: (a) unable to cost the policy accurately. As Anna Burns-Francis pointed out to him on Breakfast TV, the original ”rock solid” $2.1 billion cost he was ...
    5 days ago
  • Bernard's Top 10 @ 10 'pick 'n' mix' for March 14
    TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: Jonathon Porritt calling bullshit in his own blog post on mainstream climate science as ‘The New Denialism’.Local scoop: The Wellington City Council’s list of proposed changes to the IHP recommendations to be debated later today was leaked this ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • No, Prime Minister, rents don’t rise or fall with landlords’ costs
    TL;DR: Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said yesterday tenants should be grateful for the reinstatement of interest deductibility because landlords would pass on their lower tax costs in the form of lower rents. That would be true if landlords were regulated monopolies such as Transpower or Auckland Airport1, but they’re not, ...
    The KakaBy Bernard Hickey
    5 days ago
  • Cartoons: ‘At least I didn’t make things awkward’
    This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Tom Toro Tom Toro is a cartoonist and author. He has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. His cartoons appear in Playboy, the Paris Review, the New York Times, American Bystander, and elsewhere. Related: What 10 EV lovers ...
    5 days ago
  • Solving traffic congestion with Richard Prebble
    The business section of the NZ Herald is full of opinion. Among the more opinionated of all is the ex-Minister of Transport, ex-Minister of Railways, ex MP for Auckland Central (1975-93, Labour), Wellington Central (1996-99, ACT, then list-2005), ex-leader of the ACT Party, uncle to actor Antonia, the veritable granddaddy ...
    Greater AucklandBy Patrick Reynolds
    5 days ago
  • I Think I'm Done Flying Boeing
    Hi,Just quickly — I’m blown away by the stories you’ve shared with me over the last week since I put out the ‘Gary’ podcast, where I told you about the time my friend’s flatmate killed the neighbour.And you keep telling me stories — in the comments section, and in my ...
    David FarrierBy David Farrier
    5 days ago
  • Invoking Aristotle: Of Rings of Power, Stones, and Ships
    The first season of Rings of Power was not awful. It was thoroughly underwhelming, yes, and left a lingering sense of disappointment, but it was more expensive mediocrity than catastrophe. I wrote at length about the series as it came out (see the Review section of the blog, and go ...
    6 days ago
  • Van Velden brings free-market approach to changing labour laws – but her colleagues stick to distr...
    Buzz from the Beehive Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden told Auckland Business Chamber members they were the first audience to hear her priorities as a minister in a government committed to cutting red tape and regulations. She brandished her liberalising credentials, saying Flexible labour markets are the ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    6 days ago
  • Why Newshub failed
    Chris Trotter writes – TO UNDERSTAND WHY NEWSHUB FAILED, it is necessary to understand how TVNZ changed. Up until 1989, the state broadcaster had been funded by a broadcasting licence fee, collected from every citizen in possession of a television set, supplemented by a relatively modest (compared ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 days ago
  • Māori Party on the warpath against landlords and seabed miners – let’s see if mystical creature...
    Bob Edlin writes  –  The Māori Party has been busy issuing a mix of warnings and threats as its expresses its opposition to interest deductibility for landlords and the plans of seabed miners. It remains to be seen whether they  follow the example of indigenous litigants in Australia, ...
    Point of OrderBy Bob Edlin
    6 days ago
  • There’s a name for this
    Every year, in the Budget, Parliament forks out money to government agencies to do certain things. And every year, as part of the annual review cycle, those agencies are meant to report on whether they have done the things Parliament gave them that money for. Agencies which consistently fail to ...
    No Right TurnBy Idiot/Savant
    6 days ago
  • Echoes of 1968 in 2024?  Pocock on the repetitive problems of the New Left
    Mike Grimshaw writes – Recent events in American universities point to an underlying crisis of coherent thinking, an issue that increasingly affects the progressive left across the Western world. This of course is nothing new as anyone who can either remember or has read of the late ...
    Point of OrderBy poonzteam5443
    6 days ago

  • Positive progress for social worker workforce
    New Zealand’s social workers are qualified, experienced, and more representative of the communities they serve, Social Development and Employment Minister Louise Upston says. “I want to acknowledge and applaud New Zealand’s social workers for the hard work they do, providing invaluable support for our most vulnerable. “To coincide with World ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 hours ago
  • Minister confirms reduced RUC rate for PHEVs
    Cabinet has agreed to a reduced road user charge (RUC) rate for plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs), Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. Owners of PHEVs will be eligible for a reduced rate of $38 per 1,000km once all light electric vehicles (EVs) move into the RUC system from 1 April.  ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    7 hours ago
  • Trade access to overseas markets creates jobs
    Minister of Agriculture and Trade, Todd McClay, says that today’s opening of Riverland Foods manufacturing plant in Christchurch is a great example of how trade access to overseas markets creates jobs in New Zealand.  Speaking at the official opening of this state-of-the-art pet food factory the Minister noted that exports ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    8 hours ago
  • NZ and Chinese Foreign Ministers hold official talks
    Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Wellington today. “It was a pleasure to host Foreign Minister Wang Yi during his first official visit to New Zealand since 2017. Our discussions were wide-ranging and enabled engagement on many facets of New Zealand’s relationship with China, including trade, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    21 hours ago
  • Kāinga Ora instructed to end Sustaining Tenancies
    Kāinga Ora – Homes & Communities has been instructed to end the Sustaining Tenancies Framework and take stronger measures against persistent antisocial behaviour by tenants, says Housing Minister Chris Bishop. “Earlier today Finance Minister Nicola Willis and I sent an interim Letter of Expectations to the Board of Kāinga Ora. ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    1 day ago
  • Speech to Auckland Business Chamber: Growth is the answer
    Tēna koutou katoa. Greetings everyone. Thank you to the Auckland Chamber of Commerce and the Honourable Simon Bridges for hosting this address today. I acknowledge the business leaders in this room, the leaders and governors, the employers, the entrepreneurs, the investors, and the wealth creators. The coalition Government shares your ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    3 days ago
  • Singapore rounds out regional trip
    Minister Winston Peters completed the final leg of his visit to South and South East Asia in Singapore today, where he focused on enhancing one of New Zealand’s indispensable strategic partnerships.      “Singapore is our most important defence partner in South East Asia, our fourth-largest trading partner and a ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Minister van Velden represents New Zealand at International Democracy Summit
    Minister of Internal Affairs and Workplace Relations and Safety, Hon. Brooke van Velden, will travel to the Republic of Korea to represent New Zealand at the Third Summit for Democracy on 18 March. The summit, hosted by the Republic of Korea, was first convened by the United States in 2021, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Insurance Council of NZ Speech, 7 March 2024, Auckland
    ICNZ Speech 7 March 2024, Auckland  Acknowledgements and opening  Mōrena, ngā mihi nui. Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho.  Good morning, it’s a privilege to be here to open the ICNZ annual conference, thank you to Mark for the Mihi Whakatau  My thanks to Tim Grafton for inviting me ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Five-year anniversary of Christchurch terror attacks
    Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Lead Coordination Minister Judith Collins have expressed their deepest sympathy on the five-year anniversary of the Christchurch terror attacks. “March 15, 2019, was a day when families, communities and the country came together both in sorrow and solidarity,” Mr Luxon says.  “Today we pay our respects to the 51 shuhada ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024
    Speech for Financial Advice NZ Conference 5 March 2024  Acknowledgements and opening  Morena, Nga Mihi Nui.  Ko Andrew Bayly aho, Nor Whanganui aho. Thanks Nate for your Mihi Whakatau  Good morning. It’s a pleasure to formally open your conference this morning. What a lovely day in Wellington, What a great ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    4 days ago
  • Early visit to Indonesia strengthens ties
    Foreign Minister Winston Peters held discussions in Jakarta today about the future of relations between New Zealand and South East Asia’s most populous country.   “We are in Jakarta so early in our new government’s term to reflect the huge importance we place on our relationship with Indonesia and South ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • China Foreign Minister to visit
    Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has announced that the Foreign Minister of China, Wang Yi, will visit New Zealand next week.  “We look forward to re-engaging with Foreign Minister Wang Yi and discussing the full breadth of the bilateral relationship, which is one of New Zealand’s ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Minister opens new Auckland Rail Operations Centre
    Transport Minister Simeon Brown has today opened the new Auckland Rail Operations Centre, which will bring together KiwiRail, Auckland Transport, and Auckland One Rail to improve service reliability for Aucklanders. “The recent train disruptions in Auckland have highlighted how important it is KiwiRail and Auckland’s rail agencies work together to ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Celebrating 10 years of Crankworx Rotorua
    The Government is proud to support the 10th edition of Crankworx Rotorua as the Crankworx World Tour returns to Rotorua from 16-24 March 2024, says Minister for Economic Development Melissa Lee.  “Over the past 10 years as Crankworx Rotorua has grown, so too have the economic and social benefits that ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government delivering on tax commitments
    Legislation implementing coalition Government tax commitments and addressing long-standing tax anomalies will be progressed in Parliament next week, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The legislation is contained in an Amendment Paper to the Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill issued today.  “The Amendment Paper represents ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Significant Natural Areas requirement to be suspended
    Associate Environment Minister Andrew Hoggard has today announced that the Government has agreed to suspend the requirement for councils to comply with the Significant Natural Areas (SNA) provisions of the National Policy Statement for Indigenous Biodiversity for three years, while it replaces the Resource Management Act (RMA).“As it stands, SNAs ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government classifies drought conditions in Top of the South as medium-scale adverse event
    Agriculture Minister Todd McClay has classified the drought conditions in the Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts as a medium-scale adverse event, acknowledging the challenging conditions facing farmers and growers in the district. “Parts of Marlborough, Tasman, and Nelson districts are in the grip of an intense dry spell. I know ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • Government partnership to tackle $332m facial eczema problem
    The Government is helping farmers eradicate the significant impact of facial eczema (FE) in pastoral animals, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced.  “A $20 million partnership jointly funded by Beef + Lamb NZ, the Government, and the primary sector will save farmers an estimated NZD$332 million per year, and aims to ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    5 days ago
  • NZ, India chart path to enhanced relationship
    Foreign Minister Winston Peters has completed a successful visit to India, saying it was an important step in taking the relationship between the two countries to the next level.   “We have laid a strong foundation for the Coalition Government’s priority of enhancing New Zealand-India relations to generate significant future benefit for both countries,” says Mr Peters, ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Ruapehu Alpine Lifts bailout the last, say Ministers
    Cabinet has agreed to provide $7 million to ensure the 2024 ski season can go ahead on the Whakapapa ski field in the central North Island but has told the operator Ruapehu Alpine Lifts it is the last financial support it will receive from taxpayers. Cabinet also agreed to provide ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Govt takes action to drive better cancer services
    Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Govt takes action to drive better cancer services
    Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says the launch of a new mobile breast screening unit in Counties Manukau reinforces the coalition Government’s commitment to drive better cancer services for all New Zealanders. Speaking at the launch of the new mobile clinic, Dr Reti says it’s a great example of taking ...
    BeehiveBy beehive.govt.nz
    6 days ago
  • Work begins on SH29 upgrades near Tauriko
    Unlocking economic growth and land for housing are critical elements of the Government’s plan for our transport network, and planned upgrades to State Highway 29 (SH29) near Tauriko will deliver strongly on those priorities, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “The SH29 upgrades near Tauriko will improve safety at the intersections ...
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    6 days ago
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