Free Republic

As the people of New Zealand confront their nation's troubled past with colonization and denying the Maori people rights, a name change for the island nation is being considered as a part of its own reckoning. A petition that aims to change the Dutch anglicized name of New Zealand to its indigenous Maori designation of Aotearoa has collected more than 70,000 signatures, prompting a parliamentary committee to consider the idea. New Zealand member of parliament Debbie Ngarewa-Packer , co-leader of The Maori Party, joined All Things Considered to elaborate on the significance of this potential name change, the journey to...

New Zealand’s Covid policy has once again hit the headlines. Last week, Jacinda Ardern, the prime minister, admitted that its new plans on loosening restrictions risked turning the country into a “two-tier” society. Under the "traffic light" policy, those who are vaccinated will be able to move around and use services relatively freely, while the unjabbed will not. But this policy is not confined to the Pacific island nation: vaccine passes are gaining traction around the world as countries introduce greater freedoms for those who are immunised, risking the creation of an unvaccinated underclass. Perhaps one of the most eye-opening...

WELLINGTON, June 28 (Reuters) - New Zealand is considering making masks compulsory at high alert levels as well as compulsory scanning of QR codes to boost contact tracing in efforts to reduce the risk of coronavirus spreading, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Monday. New Zealand halted quarantine-free travel with neighbouring Australia last week as an outbreak of the highly contagious Delta variant triggered a lockdown in Sydney and renewed restrictions elsewhere. read more It also extended the COVID-19 alert level 2 in the capital Wellington until Tuesday, as authorities said there was still a risk that an Australian tourist...

Aotearoa tradition spot on 25.01.2003 By SIMON COLLINS New scientific findings have backed traditional Maori accounts that New Zealand was settled about 30 generations ago. An international team led by Associate Professor David Lowe of Waikato University has pinned down the timing of the country's biggest volcanic eruption in 1000 years, at Mt Tarawera, to the winter of 1314, give or take a dozen years. The eruption spread a layer of ash from Northland to Hawkes Bay. There are signs that people may have begun to burn forests just before the eruption, but no human artefacts have been found below...