24/01/2024
Foreign policy experts are alarmed at the Government’s undemocratic decision to step up strikes against Yemen and urgently call for permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
Leading New Zealand foreign policy group, Te Kuaka, describes the government’s decision to deploy a six-member Defence Force team to the Middle East as “deeply alarming”.
The group’s co-director Dr. Arama Rata said, “New Zealand’s involvement in the Red Sea will just inflame regional instability and cause more civilian deaths without addressing the root cause of the Houthi actions, which is ending the genocide in Gaza.”
“It is deeply alarming that this decision was made without a Parliamentary mandate, particularly given the incredibly high stakes of the situation. There has been no explicit authorisation of military action in self defence against Yemen by the UN Security Council either.”
“This sets a frightening precedent for how foreign policy decisions are made,” said Rata. “There are huge risks to not just the Middle East, but New Zealand directly, when we take the side of the US and the UK, nations that have a long history of oppressive intervention in the Global South.”
Neither Prime Minister Christopher Luxon nor Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters has called for an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza.
“By pre-empting these criticisms in its own announcement, the government is wrongly suggesting that our intervention in the Middle East will not be viewed in the context of genocide in Gaza and highlighting NZ's previous involvement in US-led misadventures – which have been similarly deadly and destructive.”
