International analyst Geoffrey Miller says New Zealand’s latest Covid-19 outbreak has once again delayed the country’s return to top-level face-to-face diplomacy – but this comes at a cost New Zealand’s new outbreak of Covid-19 has also stalled an attempt to restart the country’s top-level diplomatic engagement. Given the Delta variant’s spread in Auckland, a rumoured trip to the UN General Assembly in New York later this month by Jacinda Ardern is now all but off the table. It is the second time this year that the coronavirus has got in the way of the Prime Minister resuming international travel. A...
This week’s hard-hitting report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was a reminder of the influential and inspirational role the United Nations can play. The UN’s Secretary General, António Guterres, called the new assessment – which predicts average global temperatures will be 1.5 degrees warmer by 2040 than they were in the pre-industrial era – “code red for humanity”. The IPCC was founded in 1988 by two UN agencies – the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Its role is to distil and package the scientific evidence for climate change, based on work...
As the Tokyo Olympics come to an end, Geoffrey Miller analyses the state of New Zealand’s wider relationship with Japan – and says that a very successful partnership may be about to become a lot more complicated. As New Zealand’s very successful Olympic campaign in Tokyo draws to a close, it’s easy to be equally positive and optimistic about the state of New Zealand’s wider relationship with Japan. If New Zealand’s trading relationships were Olympic sports, Japan would miss out on a medal – but not by much. Japan is New Zealand’s fifth-biggest trading partner – behind only China, Australia,...
A statement issued by the New Zealand Government alleging Chinese state involvement in hacking goes much further than a simple, pro forma endorsement of the views of New Zealand’s allies. Geoffrey Miller explains the significance. New Zealand joined Western allies on Monday by issuing a statement that called out alleged Chinese state involvement in hacking. The statement, headlined ‘New Zealand condemns malicious cyber activity by Chinese state-sponsored actors’, leaves no room for ambiguity. Beijing knows that New Zealand will sometimes make statements that are critical of China. But this statement is unusually forthright. It cannot be easily reinterpreted in a...
Geoffrey Miller looks over the lessons from the special APEC summit Today’s special virtual APEC summit was so modest in its aims that it was officially referred to only as an ‘informal leaders’ retreat on Covid-19’. From the outset, host Jacinda Ardern dampened down expectations for the meeting, warning reporters not to expect any significant breakthroughs. In that respect, New Zealand’s Prime Minister was right. A joint statement issued after the meeting included vague commitments to accelerate the production and distribution of vaccines. There was also agreement on the need to restore international travel links and strengthen supply chains that...
Jacinda Ardern has delivered a keynote speech on foreign policy. Geoffrey Miller reads between the lines. It was about APEC. And the Indo-Pacific. But most of all, it was about China. Jacinda Ardern’s keynote foreign policy address on Wednesday – at the annual conference of the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs (NZIIA) in Wellington – was another exercise in reading between the diplomatic lines. Ordinarily, the biggest New Zealand foreign policy story of the week would have almost certainly been this speech. But Monday’s surprise announcement that Jacinda Ardern would host an impromptu virtual APEC leaders’ meeting this Friday...
What is New Zealand’s most important role in a quickly changing geopolitical world? It could be mediating between China and the West, according to international analyst Geoffrey Miller. A keynote speech by Jacinda Ardern next week will set the tone for a busy few months of foreign policy activity, culminating in NZ’s virtual hosting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ summit in November. The coming months also include the annual meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York in September and the COP26 climate change summit, to be held in Glasgow in late October and early November. Ardern...
International analyst Geoffrey Miller previews this weekend’s Otago Foreign Policy School This weekend’s Otago Foreign Policy School will be another chance for foreign minister Nanaia Mahuta to explain the Labour Government’s foreign policy agenda. The Dunedin conference has been held annually since 1966, except for last year, when it was cancelled amidst uncertainty over Covid-19. Mahuta will give the foreign minister’s traditional opening address to the conference on Friday. It will be closely watched in diplomatic circles for clues as to the future direction of New Zealand’s foreign policy under Labour. Mahuta’s speech to the China Council in April fuelled...
International analyst Geoffrey Miller explains why Benjamin Netanyahu’s ousting from power and the formation of a new coalition government in Jerusalem may be a chance for New Zealand to make a fresh start in its relationship with Israel This month’s formation of a new coalition government in Israel may be a chance for New Zealand to reset – or at least reassess – its rocky relationship with the country. The new Israeli government, in which the right-wing nationalist Naftali Bennett will initially serve as Prime Minister, is a complicated one. The coalition deal involves eight parties that span the political...
New Zealanders’ hostility towards China is growing rapidly – but the worst may be still ahead. International analyst Geoffrey Miller examines the latest survey results on how this country feels about China. The latest “Perceptions of Asia” survey from the Asia New Zealand Foundation, released today, shows a sharp rise in the number of New Zealanders who view China as a threat. 35% of New Zealanders surveyed in the study saw China as a major threat or threat – up from 22% the previous year. But the survey was conducted in late October and early November 2020 – which means...
