Tag: Peace and Conflict

In around two weeks time the government will make an important decision on whether to send New Zealand's SAS troops back to Afghanistan. The government has in front of it a very significant foreign policy decision. At stake is whether New Zealand continues on a path towards a more independent foreign policy, constructively engaged in peacemaking and peacekeeping, or whether it falls back into a more subordinate role in a Western alliance structure led by the United States.

6. KEITH LOCKE (Green) to the Prime Minister: Will he be withdrawing New Zealand’s successful provincial reconstruction team from Afghanistan, and instead sending a deployment of the New Zealand Special Air Service; if so, why?

Any decision on whether New Zealand Special Forces should return to Afghanistan must be postponed pending an inquiry into whether there was mistreatment of prisoners the NZ Special Air Service (SAS) handed over to American forces in an earlier deployment, said Green Party MP Keith Locke.

5. KEITH LOCKE (Green) to the Prime Minister: Will he make public any decision for or against the deployment of the New Zealand Special Air Service to Afghanistan as soon as a decision is reached; if not, why not?

Green MP Keith Locke investigates the claims of safety for tasers, and finds that other countries are concerned that the devices are not as safe as we have been told.

KEITH LOCKE (Green): I wish to speak on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade's budget and explain some matters that the Government should be paying particular attention to. There are too few Governments on this planet that treat matters of peace and human rights with the attention they deserve.

Green Party Defence Spokesperson Keith Locke welcomes Prime Minister John Key’s unequivocal rejection of an air strike force. "An air strike capability is not necessary for our key defence tasks, which are peacekeeping and protecting the economic zones of New Zealand and our Pacific Island neighbours," Mr Locke says.

National’s foreign policy, announced yesterday, fails to properly address the needs of the most oppressed people in the world, the Green Party says. “Human rights don’t get a mention anywhere in the policy, despite grave violations in many countries,” Green Party Foreign Affairs Spokesperson Keith Locke says.

It is a constitutional affront for the Police to threaten students wishing to conduct a citizen’s arrest of visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Green Party MP Keith Locke says. Under the International Crimes and International Criminal Court Act 2000, proceedings can be taken against people visiting New Zealand who have been responsible for torture, or the launching of attacks which cause civilian casualties ‘clearly excessive’ to military objectives.