A former New Zealand Cabinet Minister has warned that the actions of Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in tying their two countries to NATO is pushing the Pacific towards war.
Matt Robson was a Cabinet Minister in Helen Clarke’s Labour-led Coalition government, and served as NZ’s Minister for Disarmament and Associate Minister for Foreign Affairs, with intimate knowledge of Pacific affairs.
He is also a barrister with extensive experience in international law.
In a striking new interview with the Australian Citizens Party’s Citizens Insight program on YouTube, Matt Robson takes on the manufactured consensus regarding supposedly virtuous NATO standing against authoritarian Russia and China, which is being used to undermine NZ’s commitment to banning nuclear weapons and an independent foreign policy, and turn Australia and NZ into extensions of NATO in the Asia-Pacific, for confronting China.
For Australia, Anthony Albanese is continuing his predecessor’s policies, which is bad enough, demonstrating Australia’s complete lack of independence on foreign policy; for NZ however, Ardern is actually destroying her country’s foreign policy principles, including its independent commitment to nuclear disarmament, by taking NZ under NATO’s nuclear umbrella.
To see a NZ statesman say what no serving major party politician in Australia or New Zealand would be game to say today, click here to watch CITIZENS INSIGHT – New Zealand Statesman denounces Five-Eyes/NATO Pacific war plan – Matt Robson
The interview covers:
- Matt Robson’s qualified legal opinion on whether Russia’s actions in Ukraine were “unprovoked”—the excuse for siding with NATO;
- What it means legally that Australia and NZ have sided with NATO and supplied weapons to Ukraine;
- Why NZ developed an independent foreign policy which is now being abandoned by Ardern;
- The political backlash in NZ to Ardern’s policy;
- China’s actions in the Pacific, and the hypocrisy of Australia and NZ in pressuring Pacific Island nations not to deal with China;
- The current Australia-NZ-US meddling in the Pacific, including targeting some Pacific Island nations’ governments for “regime change”;
- NZ’s intelligence agencies and defence apparatus, which operates under the Five Eyes partnership with the UK, USA, Australia, and Canada, and how it is an anti-democratic force opposing the will of New Zealanders to have an independent foreign policy;
- How Australia and NZ’s strong and beneficial trade relationships with China are a foundation for peace, and a reason both countries should act in their own independent national interest.
Matt Robson’s courage to speak out is backed by his experience, going all the way back to his activism as a university student opposing the Vietnam War.
He explains he is not intimidated by smears of being a “Putin apologist” or “Chinese agent”, because he’s heard it all before, during the Vietnam war, when anyone who spoke out was accused of being an agent of “Moscow” or “Beijing”.
Matt Robson also gives a ringing endorsement of the late former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser’s forceful view that Australia should assert its independence from the USA and UK, and Fraser’s 2014 book Dangerous Allies, which exposes how Australia’s alliance with the UK and USA has always dragged us into foreign wars.
The way that more and more people with seniority and experience in foreign affairs—like Matt Robson, and like former Australian Ambassador John Lander, who was interviewed on Citizens Insight on 31 March 2022 and on 9 May 2022 (click the hyperlinks to watch)—are speaking out to warn that it is the policies being pursued by our governments that are leading to war, should alarm all Australians and New Zealanders.
It is time to heed these warnings, and use our voices to tell our political leaders to stop the insanity, and adopt independent foreign policies that are in our national interests.
Click here to watch CITIZENS INSIGHT – New Zealand Statesman denounces Five-Eyes/NATO Pacific war plan – Matt Robson
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