New Zealand

Pity MIKTA. Not so long ago, Canberra had high hopes for this obscure grouping of countries ­– Mexico, Indonesia, (South) Korea, Turkey, and Australia. Former foreign minister Julie Bishop was a particular fan of this caucus of middle powers within the G20, a gathering separate from the

In a speech delivered on 1 March at the Lowy Institute in Sydney, New Zealand’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Winston Peters launched the country’s most significant shift in foreign policy towards the Pacific Islands region in decades. The speech followed Prime Minister Jacinda

The Defence Strategic Update 2020 has provoked a significant amount of debate in Australia. The reaction across the Tasman in New Zealand has been much more subdued, but Defence Minister Ron Mark reportedly suggested that increases in Australian capability would increase the ability to respond to

One evening every June for more than 20 years, a “Pacific Night” reception has featured as a mainstay of the diplomatic circuit in Washington DC. It is organised largely through the New Zealand embassy, and also sponsored by the Australian embassy and other Pacific island countries. This year,

Canberra will be pleased and relieved that New Zealand has opted to buy Boeing’s P-8A aircraft, in order to meet its future requirements for maritime aerial intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and response. The P-8A, already operated by the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), will replace

Where are we in the fourth week of lockdown in New Zealand? The borders are sealed. As I was writing this, the Flight Radar 24 app had only two domestic flights taking place across the entire country. There were no outbound international flights, and only three aircraft heading in. The

The public aura around the decades-old “Five Eyes” intelligence sharing partnership between Australia, the US, UK, Canada, New Zealand has expanded rapidly since the name was first publicly acknowledged. In 2014, an Australian prime minister publicly referred to the “Five Eyes” for the

Nice try, you might say. Huawei has proposed a purely Kiwi workforce to assuage New Zealand’s concerns about the Chinese company’s potential involvement in developing 5G infrastructure. That might not be enough if Wellington shares the full extent of its Five Eyes partners’ concerns about

New Zealand Prime Minister John Key’s surprise resignation announcement has brought the curtain down on a political career that can only described as astonishingly successful. Still hugely popular in the second half of his third term, Key has displayed a remarkable ability to calm incipient

It was probably only a matter of time before Damien O’Connor, not one of the leading lights in Jacinda Ardern’s second-term Cabinet, stepped into some diplomatic doo-doo. But in an interview with CNBC, New Zealand’s Trade Minister has done so in spectacular style. He gets douze points for

New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta, the first Maori woman in that role, hit the ground running in her first few months in office. Not only did her appointment break barriers for Indigenous women in international affairs, she has also begun to outline a stunning example of what an

Following the deadliest terror attack in New Zealand’s history, a flood of articles have been devoted to “understanding” the accused shooter, Brenton Tarrant, decoding his manifesto, and finding reason in his actions. Yet such assessments overlook a deeper, more chilling reality: Tarrant’s

The recent news that two-thirds of United Nations member states negotiated a treaty that bans nuclear weapons was undoubtedly met with enthusiasm in much of New Zealand, which reportedly had a leading role in shepherding the talks to success. Alongside the Kiwis, 121 other non-nuclear UN member

Last week, the issue of depriving an individual of their citizenship because of terrorist activity made headlines once again. An alleged Islamic State member, Suhayra Aden, had been detained by Turkish authorities crossing from Syria into Turkey and was being readied for deportation to New Zealand.

The weekend ballot wasn’t really an election contest so much as a question whether Labour could govern in its own right. Since the introduction of proportional representation in New Zealand in 1996, no single party has won an outright majority. This year, circumstances combined to make that

Two months ago, the New Zealand National Party appeared to be cruising towards a fourth term at this Saturday's election. After the surprise retirement in late 2016 of popular Prime Minister John Key, there was a smooth leadership transition to his deputy, Finance Minister Bill English. English led

“Being in the Pacific, of the Pacific” was an aspiration announced by New Zealand’s Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs Fletcher Tabuteau at a recent conference in Wellington. New Zealand’s Pacific identity has been a continuing theme of the Pacific reset policy&

New Zealand has not had a change election since 2008 when John Key swept into power. His reliable successor, Bill English, is locked in a tight contest with Labour’s charismatic new leader Jacinda Ardern. Whichever one of them ends up Prime Minister after Saturday’s contest will occupy the apex

Almost 20 years ago to the day, then-Foreign Minister Alexander Downer addressed the University of Auckland on Australia-New Zealand relations: First and foremost, the Australia-New Zealand relationship is a partnership of equals. We do not offer each other unsolicited or patronising advice on how

“There is no closer friendship than that between Australia and New Zealand,” Malcolm Turnbull and Jacinda Ardern declared after their leadership meeting in Sydney in March. Their language reflected many such statements over the years. And it’s true. Our communities understand each

One of Jacinda Ardern’s early prime ministerial tasks was to head off some potentially bad optics in New Zealand’s most important bilateral relationship. After all, she was leading just the sort of government that Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop had said would be difficult to work with

In a speech to the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs delivered in Wellington this week, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has given us the clearest sense yet of the direction New Zealand’s coalition government will take on foreign policy. Any prime minister’s first