So after finding out Air NZ seems to be running a third party chop shop for despots and active war criminals, it turns out MFAT is approving military exports to bloody Saudi Arabia!
MFAT approved exports for military equipment to Saudi Arabia’s forces
New Zealand’s Foreign Affairs Ministry granted export permits for military equipment that was sent to Saudi Arabia’s forces in 2016 and 2018, raising concerns the government may have breached its human rights obligations.
Documents obtained by RNZ under the Official Information Act detail transactions that experts say raise human rights concerns due to Saudi Arabia’s military intervention in Yemen’s civil war. Since 2015, at least 100,000 people have died in the war, which has also displaced millions and pushed Yemen to the brink of famine.
The documents showed that in May 2016, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) approved a permit for military simulation training equipment to be sent to Saudi ground forces. In December that year, sign-off was also given for hand-held computers, radios and range-finding binoculars bound for the Saudi Navy.
The exporter, whose identity has been kept secret by MFAT, applied for an extension to its December permit after that shipment was delayed, the documents showed. This was granted in May 2018. The quantity and value of the equipment exported was also withheld.
…and as we try to get our heads around that, Jacinda is making blood profits too???
Prime minister Jacinda Ardern’s KiwiSaver profited from Saudi military deals
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s KiwiSaver provider ANZ has launched a review after being challenged for investing in three companies that supplied weapons to the Saudi Arabian military during the conflict in Yemen.
Ardern ordered an inquiry into how Air New Zealand came to be servicing engines for the Saudi Navy saying the deal did not pass the “sniff test”.
The war in Yemen is recognised as an international humanitarian crisis, and Air New Zealand has now cancelled the deal with the Saudi navy.
But even as Ardern was speaking on the Air New Zealand deal, her KiwiSaver provider, in which she has had money since at least 2015, owned shares in Britain’s BAE Systems, and two United States companies Textron and Raytheon, all three of which have supplied weapons to the Saudi military since Saudi Arabia became involved in the Yemen war.
…what this all proves is that NZ has moved quietly to believing that trade at any cost trumps any humanitarian rights issues.
For a Nation that can hold its head up high for the manner in which we fought tooth and nail against the despicable apartheid regime of South Africa, to see how far we have sold that mana for blood dollars is truly revolting.
That our Prime Minister has been caught up in it is evidence of how far we have collectively sunk. Immediate legislation is required to ensure all Kiwisaver accounts are started in an ethical account by default and how all public funds must be transferred to using such ethical investments.
It’s beyond time that we moved on this.
We are better than selling military hardware to regimes who will brutally use it against their own people for fucks sakes folks!
Come on!
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“They are us” but not when we are making money by facilitating the killing of them.
Fucking hypocrites.
‘Fucking hypocrites’. Amen!! Sums up the establishment and the mainstream perfectly.
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