New Zealand

[FD2]

I wonder how far back any 'edited' versions of events were put out by RNZ and if this wasn't the only one, why it wasn't noticed and stamped on at the time. Someone instead of monitoring their own output?

[barkingmad]

Is someone not following the Trusted News Initiative nor are they checking with BBC “Verify” before pushing out such blasphemous libel?

I think we should be told, as the UK taxpayers have paid dearly for such an initiative to be rolled out Worldwide...

[FD2]

I think RNZ seems to be taking appropriate action in this case, but oh so late. It states that so far it has uncovered 15 instances of inappropriate editing dating back to last year. Did no one contact them? If so were they ignored? Did the local Russia 'useful fools' just smile smugly and believe these articles 'confirmed' their false conceptions? It beggars belief that this went on and no one 'noticed'!

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/491663 ... in-ukraine

[Karearea]

A Ukrainian man says he complained about what he considered Russian propaganda in a RNZ story last year.

On Thursday, RNZ published a story that contained a pro-Russian view of the events surrounding Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution and Russia’s subsequent military intervention in 2014.

The story was supplied by the international news agency Reuters. It later appeared on RNZ with edits to include a pro-Russian view.

Further investigation has since revealed that more than a dozen stories had been edited on RNZ’s website to slant coverage in favour of Moscow

RNZ chief executive Paul Thompson on Saturday confirmed he had launched an external review of processes for editing online stories “to ensure these are robust”, and a staff member has been put on leave and no longer has access to RNZ computer systems.

Christchurch resident Michael Lidski said he was surprised when he learned about RNZ’s investigation this week because he had raised concerns about an article eight months ago.

In an email sent to Broadcast Minister Willie Jackson and RNZ on October 24, Lidski and members of the Ukrainian community complained about an RNZ article titled “NZ entering Ukraine conflict at whim of govt”, originally published in May that year.

In his complaint, Lidski said the RNZ story was a “definite copy of the enemy propaganda”.

“I thought it was absolutely outrageous back then, and to me, it just didn’t look like it came from New Zealand,” Lidski said on Sunday.

“It just didn’t sound right to me at all.”

Jackson responded to the complaint on November 16, acknowledging the illegal war in Ukraine and the group’s concerns on accurate and unbiased reporting.

He said he could not involve himself in operational decisions of media organisations, adding he expected media to adhere to high standards.

Jackson noted going to RNZ with the complaint was the appropriate course of action, “as it is useful for these organisations to hear the views of their audiences”.

Lidski said RNZ did not respond to his complaint.

The story has since been amended, acknowledging an earlier version “lacked balance”, and that the article was taken down on June 10 for a day, while a review took place.

Lidski said he was concerned about how far back stories may have been altered.

“Back in October I had no way of knowing ... I am shocked,” he said.

“People didn’t realise it was happening.

“We hope RNZ gets to the bottom of this, find the people that are guilty of it. And that there are mechanisms in place in the future to prevent this from happening again.”

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/132291 ... -last-year

[prospector]

There are many in the world that do not agree with a lot of the so called evidence coming out of Ukraine. there are still many countries who have no intention of letting Ukraine join NATO. as has been pushed by the American Industrial/Military complex for many years,
https://www.rt.com/news/577859-nato-ukr ... aign=Email

More than ten NATO states don’t support Ukraine's bid – Kiev
The other 21 member states have already assured Ukraine of support, the deputy head of President Vladimir Zelensky’s office says
More than ten NATO states don’t support Ukraine's bid – Kiev
NATO head Jens Stoltenberg (L) and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky give a joint press conference in Kiev. © AFP / Dimitar Dilkoff
More than ten NATO member states out of 31 don’t want Ukraine to join the US-led military bloc, Igor Zhovkva, the deputy head of Vladimir Zelensky’s office, has stated.

Kiev already has 20 signed declarations of support for its NATO bid, Zhovkva wrote on Facebook on Saturday. This means that 11 member states have so far refused to back Kiev's application.

Zhovkva published his post hours after Zelensky and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau signed a document in Kiev that signaled Ottawa’s consent to Ukraine becoming a part of NATO.

"The joint declaration clearly fixes backing for Ukraine’s membership of NATO from the Canadian side as soon as conditions permit this. This is the strongest wording among all G7 countries that are NATO members," Zhovkva wrote.

A similar declaration has also recently been signed with the government of Romania, Zhovkva added.

NATO membership ‘unlikely’ for Ukraine now – US ambassadorREAD MORE: NATO membership ‘unlikely’ for Ukraine now – US ambassador
According to the deputy head of Vladimir Zelensky’s office, those developments were "another stage of preparation for the successful NATO Summit in Vilnius in July" for Ukraine.

Earlier this week, US envoy to NATO Julianne Smith told Politico that "a proper invitation" into NATO for Ukraine is "unlikely" as long as Kiev remains in conflict with Moscow.

However, Smith pointed out that during the upcoming gathering in the Lithuanian capital, the bloc still wanted to send a message to Kiev that it was determined to keep helping it in the long term. There’s an "array of options" for NATO to do so, she added.

Russia, which sees NATO’s eastward expansion as a major security threat, had singled out Kiev’s push to join the US-led military""

What seems so strange to me is that no one seems to remember when the Russians started to move missiles into Cuba the response of the Americans was immediately make moves to block such an occurrence, the Russians realized the danger and backed off, the world was very close to a nuclear Armageddon when that happened, but when Russia does not like NATO right on its borders NATO did not see fit to back off and we have the situation develop into a war in which many thousands of young men have been killed, many disabled for life, the Ukraine infrastructure trashed, and for what?? so NATO can be on Russia"s border?

Border disputes in that part of the world have been going on for centuries, Ukraine certainly did not come out of the second world war with shining colors, especially their treatment of Polish people, men women and children.

[prospector]

https://www.msn.com/en-nz/news/national ... 59e9eab2a1&

NZ entering Ukraine conflict 'at whim of govt' - former Labour general-secretary
Saturday

Aformer senior Labour Party member says New Zealand has effectively gone to war without consulting the public by joining Nato's efforts to defeat Russia's military objectives in Ukraine.

Mike Smith, who served as general-secretary of the party from 2001-2009, told RNZ the government was helping to put back a negotiated peace settlement indefinitely by sending Defence Force personnel and resources to Europe as confrontation between Russia and the Western military alliance continues to escalate.

Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February (local time) claiming its "special military operation" would remove anti-Russian neo-Nazi elements entrenched in Kyiv's institutions of state and protect Russian-speaking populations in the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk after eight years of civil war. It wants a security guarantee its neighbour won't join Nato, which it views as a hostile threat to its borders.

Smith fears New Zealand could now find itself "on the wrong side of history" by helping prolong a conflict in the interests of waning US hegemony while risking its own interests in the Asia-Pacific region, and increasing the risks of a nuclear war.

New Zealand is also inadvertently helping to arm neo-Nazi militias and far-right groups in Ukraine with modern weapons, which could be used elsewhere, he said.

Former minister in Helen Clark's Labour coalition government, Matt Robson, echoed his concerns, and called for an informed debate in Parliament over the country's increasing involvement in the conflict.


.

[FD2]

We've had this discussion in the past prospector.

IMO anyone who follows and quotes Russia Today is one of Putin's 'Useful Fools'. Compounded by repeating the 'neo-Nazi' excuses of Putin's thieving thug chums in Moscow. That also goes for the re-edited stuff that has been put out by RNZ, seemingly through lack of proper editorial control. I'm not aware that New Zealand has any 'modern weapons' to send to Ukraine as it hasn't enough of them to defend itself, let alone donate them to Zelensky.

We all know that Ukraine has had a chequered past and is not whiter than white, but to use that as an excuse to invade and slaughter innocent citizens is beyond belief. I'm afraid I just can't be bothered to enter into a discussion over this matter so will ignore any Russian propaganda crap that gets posted.

[prospector]

FD2,
Tell me, who were the people putting out this line of propaganda, or more accurately crap.

"" Ukrainians most often Googled “Alexey Arestovich” and showed interest in the “ghost of Kiev,” a legend of a supposed hero pilot which The Wall Street Journal admitted was fake military propaganda intended to raise morale. In the “purchase of the year” category, the postage stamp “Russian Ship” was among the most popular search queries. This was a stamp issued in honor of the soldiers on Snake Island who, as the fake story went, responded in abusive language to an offer from a Russian ship’s crew to surrender and fought to the death. These border guards were “posthumously” awarded the Hero of Ukraine decoration but later it was revealed that all of them had voluntarily surrendered and were alive. ""

[Karearea]

An RNZ digital journalist who allegedly inserted pro-Russian sentiment into news stories claims they have edited reports in that way for five years and nobody queried it. ...

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zeal ... ed-it.html

[Karearea]

...It was only on Monday that RNZ editor-in-chief Paul Thompson said the audit hadn't yet found examples of "inappropriate edits" outside of Ukraine-Russia stories. But changes to stories outside of this have now been found, including edits that appear to be sympathetic towards Palestine and the militant group Hamas, and China's abuses in Xinjiang and its treatment of Uighurs. ...

Newshub: RNZ's edit scandal widens as evidence emerges of Israel-Palestine, China, transgender stories altered

[FD2]

Great cartoon in The Press today:

RNZ News.png (284.98 KiB) Viewed 674 times

[Karearea]

Meng Foon has resigned as New Zealand's Race Relations Commissioner on Friday, after failing to disclose a conflict of interest.

Chief Human Rights Commissioner Paul Hunt wrote to the government last month, outlining the undisclosed conflict.

Foon had been the director of a company that received government payments this term.

These included more than $2 million for accomodation, including emergency housing.

Associate justice minister Deborah Russell had been considering the matter with the preliminary view it was serious enough to remove him from the role.

But Foon resigned before a decision was reached, she said.

"Had the process been completed, it is probable I would have determined his actions represented a serious breach of the Crown Entities Act and I would have taken the next steps to recommend to the Governor-General to remove him from his office," Russell said.

"It is critical that all people appointed to public roles comply with their statutory duties. Meng Foon had multiple opportunities to adequately declare these interests and did not do so." ...

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/49 ... mmissioner

[OneHungLow]

IMO anyone who follows and quotes Russia Today is one of Putin's 'Useful Fools'. Compounded by repeating the 'neo-Nazi' excuses of Putin's thieving thug chums in Moscow. That also goes for the re-edited stuff that has been put out by RNZ, seemingly through lack of proper editorial control. I'm not aware that New Zealand has any 'modern weapons' to send to Ukraine as it hasn't enough of them to defend itself, let alone donate them to Zelensky.

We all know that Ukraine has had a chequered past and is not whiter than white, but to use that as an excuse to invade and slaughter innocent citizens is beyond belief. I'm afraid I just can't be bothered to enter into a discussion over this matter so will ignore any Russian propaganda crap that gets posted.

Well put and eminently reasonable.

[OneHungLow]

Sunbathing on roads, breaking through catflaps, visiting film sets, invading homes and taking in the heat of backyard spa bath covers – New Zealand’s “seal silly season” has officially begun and the country is bracing for an influx of adolescent marine mammals exploring the country’s highways, patios and golf courses.

This week, the government issued a formal public notice that “seal season” had begun – and New Zealanders could expect to encounter higher numbers of the flippered young creatures out and about, exploring human-dominated spaces. From May until December, adult males and freshly weaned pups from New Zealand’s growing fur seal population will leave their breeding colonies and head out into the wider world – many for the first time. They’re young, inexperienced and prone to adolescent misbehaviour and mishaps, hitting the wider world en masse like a cohort of fresh-minted spring breakers.

“I call it seal silly season,” says Prof Louise Chilvers, an ecologist specialising in marine wildlife at Massey University. “It’s like having a teenager being kicked out of the home – they don’t quite know what to do, don’t quite know where to feed, don’t quite know what to do with themselves. They’ve got all this freedom, so they go do a bit of exploring,” she says. “Especially in the middle of winter, it’s cold, and there’s lots of nice warm places – like right in the middle of a tar seal road where it’s held all its heat from the day.”

Last year, one young seal broke into a home via the catflap, hung out on the couch and spent several hours traumatising the family cat before being escorted back to the sea. In 2021, a seal nicknamed “Sammy” spent more than a week occupying Hobbiton, the film set used on Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings series, sunbathing and throwing eels around the lake. State highways are semi-regularly blocked by seals that have chosen them as a relaxation spot: last year, a reclining seal blocked State Highway 1, and the year before a pup stopped traffic on State Highway 25 as parents ferried their children to school.

The Department of Conservation warned the public that the pups were “exploratory by nature and exhibit some strange behaviours when hauled-up on land”, but should be left alone unless they were in immediate danger. People “may feel concerned seeing young pups alone, or seals regurgitating, sneezing, coughing or crying”, they said.

Laura Boren, a marine science adviser for the department, says that despite the season hitting every year, the department typically receives a flood of calls about the sea creatures turning up in odd spots. While many will stick to the beaches, some pups are more intrepid, ending up more than 90km from the shore.

“It’s a good conservation story that they are coming back,” Boren says, with the species recovering substantially since its numbers were decimated by sealing ships between the 1790s and 1940s. As the population returns, “they’ve been recolonising from the south to the north, and they’ve been starting to recover much of their former range”, she says. “But essentially, what we’re seeing now … is that they’re now coming into areas where we have a lot more human population.”

New Zealand’s sea lions are far rarer than seals, but as the species recovers, they too are increasingly exploring new places: occupying golf courses, conducting pitch invasions at football matches, and in one case, shutting down a busy section of road for several weeks after a sea lion mother chose it as a nursery spot.

As the spring breeding season approaches, marine mammals can also become confused, and seek love in the wrong places. In 2021, a flat of students blowing a conch shell attracted the affections of an amorous, 350kg male sea lion that demolished some of their garden and spent part of the day roaring through the windows after mistaking the noise for a prospective mate.

Both seals and sea lions are legally protected in New Zealand and conservation officers typically take a hands-off approach when they’re exploring, disturbing them only if they are in immediate danger and otherwise asking that people steer clear, slow down on open roads, keep their dogs on a leash, and enjoy their company from 20 metres away.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... son-begins

[John Hill]

What about those penguins raiding the sushi shop?

https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/ ... index.html

[FD2]

Wellington's little blue penguins with a taste for sushi have been moved to a nesting box. Our rangers report that they seemed to like it and were making cooing noises which is a good sign.

I hope it led to the patter of little feet.

[Karearea]

Auckland surgeons are now being required to consider a patient’s ethnicity alongside other factors when deciding who should get an operation first.

Several surgeons say they are upset by the policy, which was introduced in Auckland in February and gave priority to Māori and Pacific Island patients - on the grounds that they have historically had unequal access to healthcare.

Health officials stress that ethnicity is just one of five factors considered in deciding when a person gets surgery, and that it is an important step in addressing poor health outcomes within Māori and Pacific populations.

Te Whatu Ora - Health New Zealand has introduced an Equity Adjustor Score, which aims to reduce inequity in the system by using an algorithm to prioritise patients according to clinical priority, time spent on the waitlist, geographic location (isolated areas), ethnicity, and deprivation level.

In the ethnicity category, Māori and Pasifika are top of the list, while European New Zealanders and other ethnicities, like Indian and Chinese, are lower-ranked.

Some surgeons, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the new scoring tool was medically indefensible. They said patients should be prioritised on how sick they were, how urgently they needed treatment, and how long they had been waiting for it - not on their ethnicity.
...
An email by Te Whatu Ora [public health agency] business support manager Daniel Hayes in April said: “Hi team, Heads up. This is going to be the new criteria for outsourcing your patients going forward. Just putting this on your radar now so that you can begin to line up patients accordingly. Over 200 days for Māori and Pacific patients. Over 250 days for all other patients.” ...

NZ Herald: Auckland surgeons must now consider ethnicity in prioritising patients for operations - some are not happy

[FD2]

Will that help Labour in the General Election?

[bob2s]

Auckland surgeons are now being required to consider a patient’s ethnicity alongside other factors when deciding who should get an operation first.

When is this bloody world going to realize that ethnicity, colour, heritage, etc. mean bugger all, we are all members of the human race and should
all be treated equally.

[FD2]

Agree, but sadly that doesn't seem to be the plan by this government.