It’s so pathetic watching Elon Musk’s groveling bootlickers fall all over themselves on social media to defend their favorite oligarch from criticism as he becomes the world’s first trillionaire.

They’re like “Don’t be mean to the trillionaire, just become a trillionaire yourself! All you need is luck, connections, wealthy parents, the ruthlessness to step on anyone who gets in your way, and a willingness to cooperate with murderous imperial institutions like the Pentagon and the CIA!”

Elon Musk is a military-industrial complex plutocrat who is balls deep in the US intelligence cartel and recently facilitated the US-Israeli attempted regime change operation in Iran.

• LISTEN: A reading by Tim Foley
• READ MORE: US, Iran edge closer to a deal, Trump says Hormuz will be ‘open to all’

You have infinitely more in common with the average person in Iran, Cuba, Lebanon or Palestine than you have with the world’s first trillionaire.

It’s so gross how many fawning admirers this freak still has. The trillionaire is not your friend.

❖

People who say “Zionism is just the belief that Jews should have a homeland” are hilarious. Zionism isn’t some abstraction; we can all see its material manifestations with our own eyes. We can all see that Zionism means genocide, apartheid, and nonstop wars and abuse.

This isn’t some kind of theoretical debate where we all get to have our own opinions about what Zionism is and what it entails. It’s 2026, not 1890. The facts are in and the case is closed, kids. This is what Zionism is. This is the only Zionism in existence. What you see is what you get. And what you see is quantifiably one of the most evil things happening on our planet.

❖

Some guy told me, “Why are you fine with the existence of approximately 50 Islamic nation-states, but the single Jewish one is apparently too many?”

I showed him an illustration of a nail stuck in somebody’s foot and said, “Why are you fine with an entire foot made of flesh, but a single metal spike is too much? The only possible explanation is that you have a seething hatred of metal. It can’t possibly be that you object to a foreign object being violently forced into a region where it does damage.”

He got upset and wound up telling me he hopes I get murdered by Mossad.

❖

Hasbara is so gross because it’s just Zionists throwing walls of language at you to convince you you’re not seeing what you’re seeing.

You see raw video footage of the most horrifying thing imaginable in Gaza, and then you see them in the replies going “This is actually fine and normal because words words words words words words words.”

You see a news report about Israel doing something astonishingly evil in Lebanon, and there they are underneath it going “There’s actually a lot more to the story because words words words words words words words.”

You see some far right Israeli minister spouting nakedly genocidal rhetoric, and they’re swarming all over it saying “Well this isn’t actually what it looks like because words words words words words words words.”

You see every major human rights group on earth saying Israel is guilty of genocide and apartheid, and they’re running around frantically telling you it’s a giant conspiracy to frame Israel and the truth is that words words words words words words words.

You see more and more mainstream news institutions reporting on the mountains of evidence of widespread rape and torture in Israeli prisons, and they saturate the airwaves claiming it’s an antisemitic blood libel because words words words words words words words.

The idea is to just pound your intellect with a firehose of verbiage until your inner sensemaker has been shredded and you’re too confused to form a coherent picture of what’s actually going on. It’s a disgusting, abusive, and profoundly unethical thing to do to people.

But the good news is it’s not working anymore. Language is immensely powerful, but its power has its limits. Israel’s behavior has become so transparently unacceptable that no amount of word magic can manipulate people into seeing anything other than what’s happening in front of their face.

Caitlin Johnstone is an Australian independent journalist and poet. Her articles include The UN Torture Report On Assange Is An Indictment Of Our Entire Society. She publishes a website and Caitlin’s Newsletter. This article is republished with permission.

Today the US and/or Israel have been attacking Iran, Palestine, Lebanon, Yemen and Venezuela.

The US is also strangling Cuba with an illegal economic blockade, threatening Greenland and preparing for war against China.

History shows that US invasions kill, injure and destroy ordinary people’s lives, homes, essential infrastructure — and they usually leave repressive regimes to rule.

• READ MORE: Israel kills 4 in Lebanon strikes after Trump warned Netanyahu to stop
• Te Kuaka advocacy group calls for NZ transparent, independent ‘Pacific foreign policy’
• Stop Wars Aotearoa coalition
• Other US-Israel war on Iran reports

The ordinary people of the US pay the price of these wars with their lives, taxes, poverty and are dependent on jobs that manufacture weapons.

US and Israel knew their attack on Iran would trigger an international oil crisis.

The result has been massively increasing oil and food prices and profiteering here in Aotearoa New Zealand, causing the greatest suffering for working class people especially the poorest in the country and world wide.

Why have the US and israel attacked Iran?

• To enforce US and Israeli domination and control of the Middle East region and the world’s oil resources; and
• To control world central trade routes and oil supplies to the main US economic rival — China.

Waiting on oil companies
Shamefully, the current NZ government refuses to oppose the illegal US and Israeli attacks on Iran, and fails to oppose the genocide still happening in Gaza. They just wait for oil companies to determine NZ’s supply, and help mega corporations to profit.

This government has no plan for making Aotearoa New Zealand more food and energy secure. But it is increasingly integrating the NZ military with the Australian and US war machines and preparing for the US-promoted “War with China”.

We are already in a cost-of living crisis, and rising fuel prices are adding to the price of food and other essentials. Kiwi families are struggling. Many people in town and country are facing huge price increases.

Some families have been getting the government’s limited support package. But 92 percent of households don’t get anything.

Don’t let this government drag us into war. Demand an independent foreign policy for Aotearoa/NZ.

• Stop Wars Aotearoa coalition rally and march to US embassy: 2pm, Saturday 13 June 2026, Aotea Square, CBD, Auckland

The empire’s war on activism and journalism continues to escalate as the Trump administration targets leftwing streamer Hasan Piker and antiwar activist Medea Benjamin for the “crime” of bringing humanitarian aid to Cuba.

This is yet another act of aggression in the same onslaught that has seen inconvenient truth-telling and expressions of moral clarity attacked and undermined throughout the Western world at every juncture in recent years.

It is not separate from the persecution of Julian Assange for exposing US war crimes.

• LISTEN: A reading by Tim Foley

It is not separate from the steadily increasing escalations of internet censorship we’ve seen in the wake of Gaza, Ukraine, covid, January 6, the 2016 US presidential election, and any other excuse the imperial narrative managers could find.

Taking medical supplies to pediatric hospitals in Cuba is now a crime? Saving the lives of babies is a crime? This administration is beyond grotesque. https://t.co/xsvQGEYzb8

— Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) May 24, 2026

It is not separate from the Trump administration’s efforts to deport non-citizens for criticising the state of Israel.

It is not separate from the efforts to stomp out pro-Palestine protests and university campus demonstrations.

It is not separate from the arrests of activists in the UK on terrorism charges for saying the words “I support Palestine Action”.

It is not separate from activists facing criminal charges for saying “From the river to the sea” in parts of Australia and Germany.

It is not separate from imperial efforts to crack down on BDS activism and outlaw boycotts of Israeli products.

It is not separate from Israel’s ban on foreign press from entering Gaza, nor is it separate from Israel’s systematic extermination of Palestinian journalists within Gaza.

It is not separate from the artificially manufactured hysteria about “antisemitism” in Western society and the efforts of Western governments to silence criticism of Israel in the name of protecting Jews.

It is not separate from Israel’s massive increase in its hasbara budget this year and the armies of paid trolls we’ve seen swarming online discourse.

It is not separate from the nonstop barrage of imperial propaganda we see every day from the plutocratic press justifying every war and slandering every dissident.

It is not separate from the way imperial oligarchs like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Larry Ellison buy up news outlets like The Washington Post and CBS and social media platforms like TikTok and Twitter in order to manipulate the way the public thinks, acts, and votes.

It is not separate from the way tech platforms have been manipulating algorithms to hide dissident sources of information from the public and using bogus “fact checking” firms to suppress unauthorised facts.

It is not separate from government secrecy measures which forbid the public from knowing what their rulers are doing, and which aggressively punish anyone who tries to reveal inconvenient facts.

the american govt would rather try to criminalize delivering aid to a country we’ve starved, than punish the epstein class. https://t.co/h19HPsOc9m

— hasanabi (@hasanthehun) May 24, 2026

The empire is waging a relentless war on intellectual clarity and on moral clarity, because truth and morality are its enemies.

They do not want us to have unobstructed vision, lucid minds, functioning empathy centers and well-formed consciences, because if we did, we would instantly dismantle the empire brick by brick.

This is why they go after anyone who tries to expand the consciousness of Western society using activism and journalism. In an empire built on lies and fuelled by human blood, telling the truth is seen as treason and doing the right thing is seen as insurrection.

The only sane response to such a dystopian situation is to join in the revolution. Help spread unauthorised ideas and information. Take action to spread awareness of the abusive nature of the empire. They’re trying to keep it all in the dark, so we need to bring it all into the light.

They wouldn’t be fighting so hard to suppress truth and compassion if it didn’t present an immediate existential threat to their power structure.

Caitlin Johnstone is an Australian independent journalist and poet. Her articles include The UN Torture Report On Assange Is An Indictment Of Our Entire Society. She publishes a website and Caitlin’s Newsletter. This article is republished with permission.

In 2015, the John Key government announced a cooperation agreement that would see NZ Aid pay for Cuban doctors to be taught English in New Zealand before their deployment to the Pacific Islands as part of the communist island’s Medical Brigades.

Cuba, a country of just 11 million people that has been under continuous US economic sanctions since 1962, has sent more than 400,000 healthcare professionals to 155 countries over the last six and a half decades.

Since 1960, when an earthquake devastated Valdivia in Chile, Cuban doctors have been on the frontlines of medical emergencies around the globe.

• READ MORE: Other Cuban reports

They were there for the Chernobyl disaster of 1986, in Sri Lanka following the 2004 tsunami, in Pakistan after the 2005 earthquake, in Africa during the Ebola outbreak, in South Africa for the HIV/ AIDS epidemic, and Italy during the outbreak of covid.

In any given year the country has had more health professionals working in aid programmes abroad than the USA, Germany, France, Italy, Japan and the UK combined.

The National government and Cuba were unlikely bedfellows. The conservative party’s founding constitution in 1936 committed it to combating communism and socialism.

But the communist nation’s medical assistance programme has been a spectacular success when it comes to providing healthcare to those most in need, and the cooperation agreement was a concrete acknowledgement of that.

Soft power, hard currency
Cuba’s overseas doctors programme is both an exercise in what is sometimes called soft power and a source of desperately needed hard currency.

Economists are divided over whether the US dollar’s status as the global reserve currency is an “exorbitant privilege” but there’s no debate over the power it gives the US government to inflict economic devastation on its perceived enemies.

Last year, the medical journal The Lancet published an article that found that economic sanctions — the majority being unilateral imposed by the US — had caused more than 560,000 deaths every year between 2010 – 2021.

In total, the study attributes 38 million deaths – half of them children – to sanctions since 1970.

No country on earth has been under US sanctions for longer than Cuba. A 1958 arms embargo was expanded to include all goods four years later.

The laws and regulations governing the embargo have been described as the “oldest and most comprehensive US economic sanctions against any country in the world.”

Cuba not only survived those sanctions, but its commitment to investing in healthcare at home saw it achieve lower infant mortality rates over a sustained period than the US, while matching it for life expectancy.

Massively impressive
To describe that as impressive is to massively understate the achievement. Life expectancy and low infant mortality normally correlate very closely with a country’s relative wealth.

The US’s GDP per capita has been about eight times that of Cuba for decades.

During the Cold War, trade with the communist bloc helped insulate Cuba from the full impacts of the embargo. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 saw the island nation facing catastrophic shortages of oil, food and basic goods.

A deal struck between Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, in 2000, to swap Venezuelan oil for Cuban medical professionals was critical to the island nation surviving the crippling US sanctions regime.

That ended with the US’s imposition of a maritime blockade of Venezuela following its “arrest” — kidnapping is a more accurate term — of its president, Nicolas Maduro, in January of this year.

The longest running US sanctions regime in history has become a near total siege resulting in a devastating health crisis.

The UN reports that more than 100,000 patients are awaiting surgeries due to power outages.

“Shortages of electricity, fuel, medicine and medical supplies are severely disrupting emergency care, blood banks, laboratories, immunisation programmes and maternal and child health services.”

Blackouts lasting up to 20 hours have forced hospitals to suspend non-emergency operations. There’s no fuel for ambulances or private cars, so people struggle to get to health services even in an emergency.

Infant mortality has doubled to 9.9 deaths per 1000 live births. At least half of those deaths are directly attributable to US sanctions.

Last week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared Cuba a “severe national security threat” due to its military ties to China and Russia. (The US has around 800 military bases in 80 different countries. Neither China nor Russia has a base in Cuba although both are said to have spy facilities — presumably not unlike the ones the US has in New Zealand and Australia.)

And in an effort to illustrate the “heinous nature” of the Cuban government, the US last week issued an arrest warrant for its former Defence Minister, 94-year-old Raul Castro, for the 1996 shooting down of two civilian planes off the coast of Cuba.

The planes were flown by the Brothers of the Rescue, a group that both rescued Cubans attempting to flee the island and dropped anti-government leaflets over Havana.

The then President, Fidel Castro, declared the planes a threat to Cuba’s national security.

Many would take issue with that claim, but it is surely as credible as the US claim that the 57 boats it has sunk in the Caribbean and the Eastern Pacific Ocean since September last year, killing 194 people, were a threat to US national security.

The US accuses Cuba of human rights abuses, including those of medical brigade doctors who it says are victims of human trafficking and forced labour.

This would make Cuban doctors, surely, the only victims of forced labour anywhere to be given a free tertiary education before being trafficked to jobs paying significantly more than if they stayed at home.

(The American Civil Liberties Union has estimated that around 800,000 prisoners in the US produce more than $11 billion in goods while being paid just pennies an hour.)

None of the US’s explanations/accusations can be taken seriously. So, what else could be driving the ramping up of its decades old campaign to topple the Cuban government?

Noam Chomsky called it “the threat of the good example.” A poor country showing it’s possible to redistribute resources and defy Western dominance is simply unacceptable and must be crushed.

One showing that, for a fraction of the cost of what most Western countries spend on “defence,” it can be a superpower in the supply of medical assistance to the Global South is it seems doubly unacceptable.

And then there’s the threat to the bottom-line of US corporations.

ExxonMobil is currently before the courts seeking $1 billion in compensation for the nationalisation of its refineries in 1959.

Last week, the Supreme Court ruled in favour of a US company — Havana Docks Corporation — that claims its waterfront property had been seized by the Cuban government in 1960. It will likely open the floodgates to similar claims.

In 1971, the government commission that first certified that the Havana Dock Corporation’s property had been unlawfully confiscated did the same for 6000 other companies with “legitimate” claims to property worth a combined $1.9 billion ($9.3 billion in today’s term).

Every year for the last three decades, New Zealand and Australia have joined a large majority of UN General Assembly member states in voting for a non-binding resolution demanding an end to the US blockade. (Last year’s vote was opposed by the US, Israel, Argentina, Paraguay, North Macedonia and Ukraine.)

But as that blockade is being tightened to the point of catastrophe, and with the US threating an armed invasion both governments have remained mute.

It’s shameful. Doubly so given that New Zealand’s last National government acknowledged Cuba’s contribution to the alleviation of suffering caused by poverty and scarcity with its cooperation agreement.

The people of Cuba are now suffering unprecedented poverty brought on by scarcity due to an entirely man-made disaster. We know who the culprits are, but not only do our governments remain silent, they continue to be slavishly committed to military cooperation and integration with one of the world’s leading enablers and purveyors of violence.

• Our governments may be silent but civil society isn’t. Here’s a link to an international petition and a NZ one. To keep up with what’s happening in Cuba and solidarity actions in Aotearoa follow the New Zealand Cuba Friendship Society on Facebook.

Jeremy Rose is a Wellington-based freelance journalist. You can follow him on his Substack Towards Democracy.

Cuba’s Ambassador to New Zealand, Luis Morejón Rodríguez, last night made a passionate plea for his country’s sovereignty in defiance of the illegal US-led fuel blockade of the Caribbean nation.

Speaking at a packed Auckland Trades Hall, he warned that the three-month oil blockade and energy blackouts threatened the country’s public health system with dire consequences for many patients.

“In Cuba today, approximately 16,000 patients undergoing radiotherapy and more than 2800 patients receiving hemodialysis depend every day on a stable electricity supply in hospitals across the country,” he said.

• READ MORE: Cuban Ambassador denounces US aggression and violations of international law
• Two Cuba-bound aid ships missing after leaving Mexico

“These are life-sustaining treatments that cannot simply be postponed without risk.”

He said Cuba would continue to oppose Washington’s escalating military threats and economic pressure on his country.

Speaking alongside Ambassador Rodríguez was Dr Josephine Varghese, a Canterbury University lecturer who shared an eyewitness account of her recent trip to Havana.

She praised Cuba and “our collective fight against the global imperialism system”.

Military assault openly discussed
A military assault on Cuba has been openly discussed by US President Donald Trump and other White House officials since the illegal January 2 strike against Venezuela and kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and also during the current war on Iran.

Last week, Trump declared in an offhand manner that he could just “take” Cuba.

International humanitarian convoys are bringing aid to Cuba to protest against the US fuel blockade, as Cuba continues to fend off US threats of a takeover.

However, two Mexican sailboats on the Nuestra America Convoy that has just arrived in Cuba this week were reportedly missing at sea and coast guard authorities from Cuba and Mexico are looking for them.

Ambassador Rodríguez said solidarity aid flotillas were really important for Cubans as they demonstrated global support.

During his speech last night, Ambassador Rodríguez said that when energy availability became uncertain, hospitals needed to prioritise essential services, and non-urgent procedures often needed to be delayed, preserving electricity and fuel resources.

“In other words, restrictions on fuel do not only affect economic indicators. They directly affect operating rooms, diagnostic equipment, medical treatments, and ultimately the health and well-being of patients,” he said.

‘Coercion and collective punishment’
“That is why Cuba has described these measures as economic coercion and collective punishment.”

On January 29, the White House issued an executive order blocking oil exports to Cuba, which imports around 60 percent of its fuel.

Ambassador Rodríguez said the world was living in a moment when the international system was being tested.

“Increasingly, we see the logic of power challenging the logic of law.

“For countries like Cuba — small countries — international law is not an abstract concept. It is our main protection.”

He criticised President Trump’s claim in January that Cuba represented an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to US national security.

“Let us pause for a moment and reflect on that statement. Cuba is a Caribbean island of 10 million people,” he said.

‘We do not project power’
“We do not possess nuclear weapons. We do not have military bases abroad. We do not project military power internationally.

“And yet we are described as an extraordinary threat.

“But this declaration is not merely rhetorical. It has very concrete consequences.”

With Cubans continuing to live under prolonged blackouts and the government preparing for military confrontation, the audience last night celebrated Cuba’s courageous resistance, saying it was an inspiration to the world.

The fuel blockade, enforced by the US naval armada in the Caribbean, piles pressure on top of Washington’s economic embargo that has been in place since the early 1960s.

Discussing the impact of the blockade on Cubans that she witnessed on her travel to Cuba in January, Dr Varghese said the unjust US measures “denied working people access to the most basic necessities, from medicines to electricity and transportation”.

She linked the Cuban crisis to the Palestinian, Iranian and Venezuelan struggles for peace and justice.

The Cuba Friendship Society, which sponsoring last night’s meeting chaired by retired trade unionist Robert Reid, noted that the only crime of Cuba and its people was that of overthrowing a US-backed dictator in 1959, and then defending their sovereignty and other conquests of their revolution in the six decades since.

The ambassador is also speaking at public meetings in Christchurch (March 17) and Wellington.

This is a moment of great peril for the small Caribbean nation of Cuba. Nothing less than its sovereignty is on the line as the US drives its knee into the neck of 10 million Cubans by means of a crushing air and sea blockade and a set of secondary sanctions designed to muscle the nations of the world into compliance to the hegemon.

The issues are not particular to Cuba; we are in the midst of a militant US that is determined to assert domination through force.

It was therefore a pleasure to spend time this week with Luis Ernesto Morejón Rodríguez, Cuba’s Ambassador to New Zealand in Wellington.

Aotearoa New Zealand’s coalition government has introduced a bill to criminalise “improper conduct for or on behalf of a foreign power” or foreign interference that echoes earlier Cold War times, and could capture critics of New Zealand’s foreign and defence policy, especially if they liaise with a “foreign country”.

It is a threat to our democracy and here is why.

A spectre is haunting the Pacific. It is focused on Solomon Islands today, but has eyes everywhere and might pounce anywhere next.

No, I’m not talking about China. I am talking about us.

More specifically, I’m talking about a particular type of Western security pundit, who hypes danger and itches for confrontation. And I am talking about the way our politicians behave when they strive to win votes by stoking fear of the world outside our borders.

• READ MORE: Rethinking Solomon Islands security
• Three questions about Australia’s infrastructure promise to Solomon Islands
• On a journey from trauma to peace in the PNG highlands
• The cruel ironies of the 2021 Honiara riots
• Solomon Islands’ slippery slide to self-implosion
• Other Solomon islands security reports on Asia Pacific Report

The saga of China’s “military base” in Solomon Islands demonstrates how unhelpful such behaviour is, both to our own interests, and to the people of the Pacific.

If you had the good fortune of missing the last few weeks, here’s what happened.

In late March, journalists revealed that China and Solomon Islands had signed a policing agreement. Someone from within the Solomon Islands government also leaked a broader draft security agreement with China.

In April, this agreement was finalised and signed. (Its text hasn’t been released but appears likely to be very similar to the draft.) You can see the draft here. It’s short and clear.

Ship visits and stopover
Solomons can ask China to provide police and military assistance. If, and only if, the Solomon Islands government of the day consents, China can “make ship visits to, carry out logistical replenishment in, and have stopover and transition in Solomon Islands, and relevant forces of China can be used to protect the safety of Chinese personnel and major projects in Solomon Islands.”

Permanent bases are not mentioned.

This, however, didn’t stop antipodean pundits from racing to hype the threat of a Chinese base. To be fair, few went as far as David Llewellyn-Smith, who demanded that Australia preemptively invade Solomons.

He was an outlier (although it didn’t stop him from being uncritically quoted in the Courier-Mail). But all spoke of a base as a near certainty.

Then politicians piled on. Penny Wong, who normally displays an impressive understanding of aid and the Pacific, decried the agreement as the “worst failure of Australian foreign policy in the Pacific since the end of World War II”.

Peter Dutton warned that Australia could now expect “the Chinese to do all they can”. (Although he added optimistically they were unlikely to do so before the election.)

Barnaby Joyce fretted about Solomons becoming a, “little Cuba off our coast”. (Solomons is more than 1500km from Australia; Cuba is about 200km from the US.)

Australian agreement similar
Amidst the racket, much was lost. Australia has its own security agreement with Solomon Islands. It’s more carefully worded, but it affords Australia similar powers to China.

And China already has a security agreement with Fiji. Indeed, there was real talk of a base when that agreement was signed, but no base materialised, and the agreement has had no effect on regional security.

And as Scott Morrison pointed out, Manasseh Sogavare, the Solomon Islands Prime Minister, has explicitly ruled out a Chinese base.

True, Sogavare is a political maneuverer who can’t be taken at his word. But a Chinese base in Solomons serves neither his interest, nor that of the Chinese.

It doesn’t serve Sogavare’s interests because it won’t give him what he wants — a stronger hold on power. Seen as the embodiment of a corrupt elite, he’s unpopular in Honiara. His election brought riots.

As did his standoff with Malaitan Premier Daniel Suidani. So he wants Chinese police training and maybe military assistance in times of instability. But a base won’t help.

Solomons is a Sinophobic country and the obvious presence of a base will increase Sogavare’s unpopularity. It would also jeopardise the security support he gets from Australia, as well as Australian aid. (By my best estimate, based on Chinese promises, which are likely to be overstatements, Australia gave more than 2.5 times as much aid to Solomons in 2019, the most recent year with data.)

Base isn’t in China’s interest
I’m not defending Sogavare. I’d rather Chinese police weren’t helping him. But a base isn’t in his interest. And he’s no fool.

A base isn’t in China’s interests either. I don’t like China’s repressive political leaders. But their military ambitions are limited to places they view as part of China. What they’ve done, or want to do, in Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan is odious.

But Australia isn’t next on their list. Outside of their immediate sphere of influence they want trade. They need trade, and the wealth it brings, to sustain the political settlement that keeps them prosperous and in power. Any war that saw China menace Australia from Solomon Islands would bring ruinous sanctions in its wake. (US bases in Guam and Okinawa would be a headache too, I’d imagine.)

The broader security agreement is helpful to China: it gives them the ability to protect Chinese nationals and Chinese business interests if riots break out.

But they don’t need a base for that. A base would be costly, hard to establish in a country with little available land, and quite possibly useless next time the Solomons government changes.

I’m not a supporter of the security agreement. But it’s not a base. And it’s not a catastrophe.

Our behaving like it’s a catastrophe is harmful though.

Harmful to Australia and NZ
It’s harmful to countries like Australia and New Zealand, because the main advantage we have over China in the Pacific is soft power. Thanks to anti-Chinese racism and a healthy wariness of China’s authoritarian government, most people in Pacific countries, including political elites, are more hesitant in dealing with China than with us.

Sure, money talks, and China can procure influence, but we are a little better liked. And that helps. Yet we lose this advantage every time we talk of invading Pacific countries, or call the region our “backyard”, or roughly twist the arms of Pacific politicians.

The Pacific is not some rogue part of Tasmania. It’s an ocean of independent countries. That means diplomacy is needed, and temper tantrums are unhelpful.

Worse still, our propensity to view the Pacific as a geostrategic chessboard has consequences for the region’s people. Geopolitical aid is too-often transactional and poorly focused on what people need. It is less likely to promote development.

There’s an alternative: to choose realism over hype in our collective commentary. And to earn soft power by being a respectful and reliable partner. It’s not always easy. But it’s not impossible. Yet it has completely escaped us in the shambles of the last few weeks.

Dr Terence Wood is a research fellow at the Development Policy Centre, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University. His research focuses on political governance in Western Melanesia, and Australian and New Zealand aid. Republished with permission.

Cuba will develop relationships with Pacific countries despite pressure from the United States, says a visiting advocate.

On a tour of New Zealand, Leima Martinez Freire, Asia Pacific director of the Cuban Institute for Friendship with the Peoples (ICAP) said Cuba was in a position to offer support to Pacific nations.

The Latin American country currently provides medical aid, doctors and training programmes to Kiribati, Vanuatu and others through bilateral agreements.

READ MORE: Sope praises Fidel Castro over Cuban backing of Vanuatu independence

However, Freire told Asia Pacific Report this week that the US was attempting to dictate how these countries engaged with Cuba.

“The objective of the policies of the US is to isolate Cuba and prevent other countries from receiving Cuban help,” she said.

US blockade
The US imposed an embargo on Cuba in 1960 in response to the Cuban revolution and the nationalising of American owned oil refineries.

Known as El Bloqueo, or “The Blockade”, the embargo is still in place and prohibits trade between the two countries. It also restricts foreign subsidiaries of US companies from doing business with Cuba, making it difficult for foreign countries themselves to conduct trade.

Freire said Cuba’s relationships with Pacific countries allowed the sharing of expertise and humanitarian aid.

“We’re talking about bilateral relationships that brings in programmes that are for the benefit of the most disadvantaged people.”

Cuba also offers trading programmes for students of Pacific countries to travel to Cuba and receive full medical training.

Medical training
Thirty ni-Vanuatu doctors were trained through the programme and more would be sent to Cuba for study.

Freire said the schemes were important because they were completely funded and once trained, the doctors would return to their countries where they could serve the community.

“They don’t pay for accommodation, food, school supplies. The only commitment is to study hard and return to their communities.”

Despite the pressure from the US, Freire said she was positive Pacific countries could make their own decisions about what was best for their people.

“I’m positive and optimistic that the different countries could decide their own future for the benefit of the people.”

Cuba-China relationship
Cuba also had a strong relationship with China through which it traded in biotechnology, clean energy and received financing.

Freire, who also spoke at public meetings in Auckland and Wellington, said she hoped the relationship would enable more help to reach the Pacific.

“I know China has their interests in the Asian Pacific region, I think that together we can implement programmes for the benefit of the people,” she said.

“Probably China with the resources they have and Cuba with the knowledge we have, it could be tremendous support for the populations of the Pacific.”

Freire was visiting New Zealand and Australia on behalf of ICAP before she returned home to Cuba.

She hopes ICAP – founded 59 years ago by former President Fidel Castro – can reach as many people as it can.

She implored New Zealanders to learn more about Cuba and especially by reading content from Cuban writers, journalists and bloggers.

Correcting ‘misinformation’
“There is a lot of misinformation about what is happening in Cuba. Always try to contrast that information.”

She said the best thing was to visit Cuba to see how the society solves its own problems under the US embargo designed to cripple a socialist country.

“I think what is happening to Cuba it is common to other countries. It is the powerful countries telling small countries what they should do.

“That is what we all should denounce. Every country has the right to develop itself and be independent.”

The Cuban ambassador to New Zealand, Mario Alzugaray Rodriguez, was present at Freire’s talk in Auckland.

Michael Andrew is the Pacific Media Centre’s Pacific Media Watch freedom project contributing editor.

• ICAP

Pacific Media Watch Newsdesk

Vanuatu Prime Minister Charlot Salwai Tabimasmas has expressed his country’s concern about the vast flows of refugees and migrants, noting that in 2016 the number of displaced people around the world stood at 65 million during his speech today to the 72nd United Nations General Assembly.

He also appealed to France to honour the will of the people with the 2018 referendum on independence in New Caledonia due next year and appealed to the UN Human Rights Council to investigate violations in West Papua.

UN summary
An exodus to cities and a high rate of urbanisation was a challenge as well. There was a clear link between forced migration and the responsibility to protect. As a small island developing state facing rising sea levels, Vanuatu appealed to the international community to consider a legal framework to address the issue of climate change refugees.

For Vanuatu, the United Nations represented the best hope and catalyst for peace and security, as well as for lifting millions out of poverty, he said. To remain relevant, however, strategic reforms were needed. Being a permanent member of the Security Council was a responsibility and it was incumbent on the organ to move beyond the political interests of its members and to find compromise solutions. Vanuatu supported Council reforms which reflected current geopolitical trends with fairer regional representation, he said.

Vanuatu’s graduation from least developed country status did not eliminate its vulnerability to natural hazards, nor must it upset or hinder its development, he said. The transition mechanism for graduating countries must be strengthened. Conveying his government’s concern about threats to peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region, he urged the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to halt its missile and nuclear development programme, reaffirmed Vanuatu’s commitment to the denuclearization of the Pacific and welcomed the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

Hurricanes and tropical cyclones around the world were warnings from Mother Nature that climate change was happening faster than efforts to respond to it, he said. Deeper thought and greater efforts were needed. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions would make a difference, he said, urging the United States to review its decision on the Paris Agreement and to implement it. He emphasized his country’s commitment to reverse the decline of the health of the world’s oceans, including through a ban on plastic bags by 2018.

Looking ahead to the 2018 referendum in New Caledonia, he urged the administration there to honour the will of its people. The Human Rights Council should meanwhile address the situation in West Papua, he said, calling for decolonisation to be put back on the United Nations radar.

Full address in French

Transcription by ETAN
16:55:

My government, Mr President, is worried to note that the UN has lost a lot of its capacity and will to implement Resolution 1514 of 14th December 1960 which expressed the need to put an end swiftly and unconditionally to colonialism in all of its forms and manifestations.

Ending colonialism has to reappear on the UN radar and all efforts in this regard have to be free of international political pressure. We all have a collective responsibility to guarantee self-determination to people who are under colonial yoke …

18:10:
Mr President,

For are half a century now, the international community has been witnessing a gamut of torture, murder, exploitations, sexual violence, arbitrary detention inflicted on the nationals of West Papua perpetrated by Indonesia. But the international community turned a deaf ear to their appeals for help.

We urge the Human Rights Council to investigate these cases. We also call on our counterparts throughout the world to support the legal right of West Papua to self-determination and to jointly with Indonesia put an end to all kinds of violence and find common ground with the nationals to facilitate putting together a process which will enable them to freely express their choice.

• Vanuatu’s full UN address summary
• West Papua ignored by most NZ major parties
• More West Papua stories
• Solomon Islands statement to UN
• Tonga’s statement to UN – no mention of West Papua
• Kiribati’s statement to UN – no mention of West Papua

Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro’s contribution to global social justice and dignity, and to developing nations worldwide – including the Pacific, was praised in New Zealand tonight.

Activists, politicians, academics, journalists, teachers, trade unionists and community workers were among about 100 people gathered at the Auckland Trades Hall to hear Cuban Ambassador Mario Alzugaray and other speakers give tributes to Castro’s life.

Alzugaray challenged the audience to continue Castro’s half century of struggle for a better society: “The best way to remember Fidel is to carry on his legacy and keep it alive.”

The ambassador said Castro had social justice at the core of his ideals and action.

“He was an internationalist since the very beginning,” Alzugaray said.

“He was involved in every movement connected to the anti-imperialist struggle in Latin America.”

Before and after the Moncada garrison attack in 1953, Castro had recognised the importance of launching an appeal to the Cuban people.

Revolutionary spark
The Moncada garrison in Santiago de Cuba was named after General Guillermón Moncada, a hero during the war of independence against the Spanish.

The attack by a small group led by Castro failed but this is regarded as the spark that fired the socialist Cuban Revolution, which eventually overthrew the brutal dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista six years later.

Castro died, aged 90, on November 25 and his funeral will be in Santiago tomorrow after the four-day cortege around the country.

“Fidel was the first one to effectively and successfully unite Cubans around the revolution,” Ambassador Alzugaray said.

The envoy praised Castro’s social policies in Cuba, such as agrarian reform, education and health.

“Fidel’s determination and involvement in international affairs made him possibly the most important leader to look after and represent the interests of developing nations,” Alzugaray said.

“His influence is huge and although CNN and other media organisations are trying to focus on the reaction of Cuban-American extremists in Miami, there are millions of people mourning the death of Fidel.”

Media ‘bias’
Alzugaray was critical of the “bias” of many news media in New Zealand and other Western countries.

“I was asked if Fidel was divisive. We live in a divisive world,” Alzugaray said.

“Greed and personal interest are driving society in many parts of the world.

“It is completely biased to raise this opinion and to be silent about the United States embargo and permanent hostility towards Cuba.”

Alzugaray said people had to decide whether they were on the side of the poor, starving, or the rich and powerful. Fundamental rights needed to come before a narrow Western concept of human rights.

“What Western powers and oligarchs can’t forgive is the huge impact of Fidel’s personality and, more importantly, his ideas, in international politics.

“Most of us will have people supporting or expressing their dissent. You just have to decide which side you’re joining.

Issues of humanity
“Fidel was very much involved in every important international issue affecting humanity.

“Environment, international financial order, independence and liberation movements, peace and global disarmament as well as human development as a comprehensive concept are some of the issues.

“He understood you can’t be poor, starving, homeless or lacking the fundamental right of proper access to public health and considered being part of an effective democracy.”

“Fidel never took a rest. He was until the end very much involved in food security issues.”

Other speakers included Unite Union director Mike Treen, of the Cuban Friendship Society, organisers of the celebration, who said Castro had played a central role as a leader of the Cuban revolution for more than 50 years.

“In that time Cuba has literally saved the lives of millions of people through their medical aid programme,” he said.

“They have helped liberate southern Africa from apartheid and colonialism. They have ended illiteracy in their own country and repeated the practice across the globe.

“They have helped create the possibility for other countries in Latin America and the world to join them on the march to national independence and social justice.”

Treen also praised Castro’s support for independence movements in the Pacific, such as in Vanuatu and Kanaky/New Caledonia, and health care in Timor-Leste and across the region.

• Fidel Castro’s ashes begin journey across Cuba
• Fidel Castro’s anti-colonialist legacy
• Castro’s funeral procession reaches Santiago
• Video clip of ambassador’s speech
• Sope praises Castro over Vanuatu

Cuban Ambassador Mario Alzugaray speaking at the Auckland Trades Hall tonight.
Video clip: Café Pacific