Forty years ago today, French secret agents bombed the Greenpeace campaign flagship  Rainbow Warrior in an attempt to stop the environmental organisation’s protest against nuclear testing at Moruroa Atoll in Mā’ohi Nui.

People gathered on board Rainbow Warrior III to remember photographer Fernando Pereira, who was killed in the attack, and to honour the legacy of those who stood up to nuclear testing in the Pacific.

The Rainbow Warrior’s final voyage before the bombing was Operation Exodus, a humanitarian mission to the Marshall Islands. There, Greenpeace helped relocate more than 320 residents of Rongelap Atoll, who had been exposed to radiation from US nuclear testing.

• READ MORE: David Robie: New Zealand must do more for Pacific and confront nuclear powers
• Other Rainbow Warrior reports

The dawn ceremony was hosted by Ngāti Whātua Ōrākei and attended by more than 150 people. Speeches were followed by the laying of a wreath and a moment of silence.

Tui Warmenhoven (Ngāti Porou), the chair of the Greenpeace Aotearoa board, said it was a day to remember for the harm caused by the French state against the people of Mā’ohi Nui.

Warmenhoven worked for 20 years in iwi research and is a grassroots, Ruatoria-based community leader who works to integrate mātauranga Māori with science to address climate change in Te Tai Rāwhiti.

She encouraged Māori to stand united with Greenpeace.

“Ko te mea nui ki a mātou, a Greenpeace Aotearoa, ko te whawhai i ngā mahi tūkino a rātou, te kāwanatanga, ngā rangatōpū, me ngā tāngata whai rawa, e patu ana i a mātou, te iwi Māori, ngā iwi o te ao, me ō mātou mātua, a Ranginui rāua ko Papatūānuku,” e ai ki a Warmenhoven.

A defining moment in Aotearoa’s nuclear-free stand
“The bombing of the Rainbow Warrior was a defining moment for Greenpeace in its willingness to fight for a nuclear-free world,” said Dr Russel Norman, the executive director of Greenpeace Aotearoa.

He noted it was also a defining moment for Aotearoa in the country’s stand against the United States and France, who conducted nuclear tests in the region.

In 1987, the New Zealand Nuclear Free Zone, Disarmament, and Arms Control Act officially declared the country a nuclear-free zone.

This move angered the United States, especially due to the ban on nuclear-powered or nuclear-armed ships entering New Zealand ports.

Because the US followed a policy of neither confirming nor denying the presence of nuclear weapons, it saw the ban as breaching the ANZUS Treaty and suspended its security commitments to New Zealand.

The Rainbow Warrior’s final voyage before it was bombed was Operation Exodus, during which the crew helped relocate more than 320 residents of Rongelap Atoll in the Marshall Islands, who had been exposed to radiation from US nuclear testing between 1946 and 1958.

The legacy of Operation Exodus
Between 1946 and 1958, the United States carried out 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands.

For decades, it denied the long-term health impacts, even as cancer rates rose and children were born with severe deformities.

Despite repeated pleas from the people of Rongelap to be evacuated, the US government failed to act until Greenpeace stepped in to help.

“The United States government effectively used them as guinea pigs for nuclear testing and radiation to see what would happen to people, which is obviously outrageous and disgusting,” Dr Norman said.

He said it was important not to see Pacific peoples as victims, as they were powerful campaigners who played a leading role in ending nuclear testing in the region.

Between March and April this year, Rainbow Warrior III returned to the Marshall Islands to conduct independent research into the radiation levels across the islands to see whether it’s safe for the people of Rongelap to return.

What advice do you give to this generation about nuclear issues?
“Kia kotahi ai koutou ki te whai i ngā mahi uaua i mua i a mātou ki te whawhai i a rātou mā, e mahi tūkino ana ki tō mātou ao, ki tō mātou kōkā a Papatūānuku, ki tō mātou taiao,” hei tā Tui Warmenhoven.

A reminder to stay united in the difficult world ahead in the fight against threats to the environment.

Warmenhoven also encouraged Māori to support Greenpeace Aotearoa.

Dr Norman believed the younger generations should be inspired to activism by the bravery of those from the Pacific and Greenpeace who campaigned for a nuclear-free world 40 years ago.

“They were willing to take very significant risks, they sailed their boats into the nuclear test zone to stop those nuclear tests, they were arrested by the French, beaten up by French commandos,” he said.

Republished from Te Ao Māori News with permission.

Last night’s Matariki drone show was an emotional experience for some of the thousands who huddled under the glow at the edge of Lake Rotorua on the eve of Aotearoa’s national indigenous holiday today.

The Aronui Indigenous Arts Festival is hosting the first ever matauranga Māori story told with 160 drones over the Rotorua Lake last night and tonight.

The show is created by Te Arawa artists Cian Elyse White and Mataia Keepa, who were helped to tell the story by Rangitiaria Tibble and James Webster.

• READ MORE: Other Matariki reports

In both te reo Māori and English, the show tells the stories of environmental markers connected to the star cluster.

Lynmore Primary School deputy principal Lisa Groot went with a group of tamariki from the school.

The teachers had spent time together remembering those who had died in the past year, and so the display hit deep.

“The waka picks the stars up on the way, seeing it in the drone show made us quite emotional.

‘So simple to understand’
“It was so simple for everyone to understand.”

She said the group had wanted to join up for the event.

“We wanted to finish our night together, it was a beautiful way to do it.”

Frances Wharerahi said to be part of the Matariki festivities gave the children te ao Māori experiences alongside whānau.

The show was appreciated by a wide audience, and Wharerahi said as she looked around at who was watching and there were old and young standing with “people from all parts of the world”.

A statement from the charitable trust said it believed that while the drone show was a risk for a reasonably new trust, it had paid off.

“Arts is an essential service. Arts deserves investment.

‘Tough time for people’
“It’s a tough time for people at the moment with the current state of inflation and the economic climate, however, events that deliver on social impact and the uplift of communities that can be brought together under a positive premise are important to our livelihood.

“These events sustain us and give our future generations something to aspire towards.”

Rotorua Trust is among the major funders of at least at $10,000, and in-kind partners helping to promote, volunteer or support include Bay Trust, Te Kuirau Marae, Bay of Plenty Regional Council and Rotorua Lakes Council.

Aronui Indigenous Arts Festival was founded in 2019 and aimed to create a platform for Rotorua arts talent.

The charitable trust is made up of local community arts and business leaders.

Local Democracy Reporting is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air. Published as a collaboration.

On the 35th anniversary of te reo Māori becoming an official language, the Māori Language Commission is warning more work is needed to ensure its survival.

In 1987, a bill introduced by Koro Wetere was passed after years of campaigning — including the Māori language petition, the land marches and Ngā Tamatoa movements.

Until the late 1960s, the language was officially discouraged and tamariki faced corporal punishment for speaking their native tongue.

• READ MORE: Other Te Reo Māori reports

Broadcaster and educator Dr Haare Williams — on an RNZ panel about the language bill broadcast in 1986 — said it was crucial for the country that it survive.

“We should never underestimate the emotive power of the Māori language. The danger of loss is irretrievable and like the plague the danger is contagious,” Williams said.

“Should we lose the Māori language in this country, both Māori and Pākehā will be the losers and both will be guilty of allowing it to die.”

Thirty-five years later, Te Taura Whiri i te reo Māori chief executive Ngahiwi Apanui is celebrating where te reo is at but also taking stock.

Demand for courses high
While demand for courses is through the roof and about 30 percent of people today consider themselves proficient in te reo Māori, it would still be classified as endangered.

Apanui said the goal of one million reo speakers by 2040 was still a long way off.

“Only 3000 teachers today to satisfy demand for kids going into Māori medium and for English medium, they need 30,000 teachers. So that kind of gives you an idea of the problem or the issue that we face,” Apanui said.

“The good thing is there’s unprecedented demand for te reo but the issue is what is the production line.”

That was evident in the disparities faced by the very language nests that are meant to help the reo flourish.

Kohanga and Kura Kaupapa were set up in the same wave in which Parliament acknowledged te reo Māori. But since their inception they have had to fight for funding, resources and acknowledgment.

Te Rūnanganui of Ngā Kura Kaupapa chair Rawiri Wright said if they were better resourced, successive governments would be closer to their own reo goals.

“There were more than 800 kōhanga reo, there are now 480 there or thereabouts and if Kura Kaupapa Māori had been properly and equitably resourced … we currently have 6500 students in kaupapa Māori but there should be closer to 10,000.”

inequities over the language
Wright said teaching the language runs deeper than just understanding what was being spoken.

“It’s not just about reo Māori, it’s about mātauranga Māori, tikangi Māori, Māori worldview, Māori face, belief, essence and just being Māori,” he said.

Ngahiwi Apanui said there were still inequities in accessing the language, and mainstream schools were important to addressing that.

“Not all Māori are in Māori medium … and often it’s socioeconomically related, if you look through South Auckland, for instance, you won’t find as many children coming out of families speaking te reo Māori as you would if you looked at the middle working class sector of society in Wellington,” Apanui said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The news last week that University of Auckland public health researcher Dr Simon Thornley was retracting a co-authored paper about supposed vaccination risks during pregnancy raised deeper questions about the limits of academic freedom.

Dr Thornley’s own head of department had called for the paper to be retracted due to “the anxiety it is creating for expectant parents and those planning to have a child”. Other experts in the field had strongly criticised the paper’s methodology and conclusions.

The university itself responded publicly by asserting, “As an academic staff member […] Dr Thornley has the right to exercise his academic freedom.”

• READ MORE: Let’s choose our words more carefully when discussing mātauranga Māori and science
• How a fake ‘free speech crisis’ could imperil academic freedom
• If not in a university, then where? Academia must define harm to allow open debate on difficult issues

The vice-chancellor later said, “While the university supports academic freedom, we do require research to be conducted with a high degree of integrity.”

The controversy follows an earlier one in July, when a group of academics published an open letter questioning the scientific status of mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge). The Royal Society Te Apārangi issued a statement rejecting their views and affirming the value of mātauranga Māori as a knowledge system.

The society is now reported to be investigating two of its fellows who were co-authors of the letter.

In response, a group calling itself the Free Speech Union has called the Royal Society’s response an attack on free speech, saying it sends “a chilling message” to other academics.

Covid-19 vaccination paper criticised as ‘disinformation’ is being withdrawn, co-author Simon Thornley says https://t.co/WZFF068Gdj

— Stuff (@NZStuff) November 16, 2021

Freedom and integrity
These are just two of several conflicts currently playing out in Aotearoa New Zealand over the limits of academic freedom.

Tricky trade-offs surround particular cases like these, and they are not easily resolved. But debates over difficult cases are too often hampered by shallow conceptions of the role of universities within society and flimsy understandings of academic freedom.

Public universities have a public mission: they serve society through generating new knowledge and teaching students. They also, in the language of the Education and Training Act 2020, serve as a “repository of knowledge and expertise” and play a role as “critic and conscience of society”.

University staff and students are granted certain freedoms under the act to fulfil these socially valuable functions.

Two fundamental ideas provide the rationale for academic freedom. The first is that freedom of inquiry is essential for the advancement of knowledge.

Without the freedom to explore new ideas and to test received wisdom, the quest for knowledge cannot progress.

The second is the idea that universities should be free from interference that would corrupt the integrity of research and the dissemination of research findings. It is in the public’s interests that neither the state nor private individuals and corporations are allowed to muzzle researchers from publicising what they know when the public would benefit from knowing.

A debate over science’s role in colonisation and the status of mātauranga Māori has spiralled into a disciplinary process and sparked concerns about impingement on academic freedoms. @SamSachdevaNZ reports https://t.co/H8a4c0GKMJ

— Newsroom (@NewsroomNZ) November 17, 2021

High ethical standards
Institutional autonomy and the right to critically question are essential if universities are to be reliable sources of knowledge and expertise for society at large. But neither implies academics should be free to do what they like or to say what they like with impunity.

The Education and Training Act couples the freedoms granted to universities with expectations of public accountability. It says tertiary institutions should have

as much independence and freedom to make academic, operational, and management decisions as is consistent with the nature of the services they provide, the efficient use of national resources, the national interest, and the demands of accountability.

In turn, the legislation places on tertiary institutions the responsibility to ensure the “highest ethical standards” are maintained.

That’s as it should be. Just as we expect medical associations to hold doctors accountable to high standards of competent practice and ethical conduct, so should we expect tertiary institutions to hold academics to the same high standards.

Critic and conscience
Controversial or unpopular opinions are sometimes just what society needs to hear. That’s why the law recognises a “critic and conscience of society” role for academics — the role of speaking truth to power, as we like to say.

But the usefulness of dissenting views to society cannot be defended if these opinions rest on faulty evidence or demonstrable falsehoods. Misinformation is incompatible with performing a role as critic and conscience of society.

From the public’s point of view, a university is malfunctioning if it harbours and protects misinformation. It ceases to be a reliable source of knowledge and expertise.

Likewise, academic freedom does not provide an exemption from ethical standards. Like all public institutions, we should expect universities to be places that foster healthy and respectful relationships, and serve wider societal goals of improving well-being, overcoming injustices and combating environmental destruction.

Universities that tolerate bullying and harassment of staff and students, or marginalise already disadvantaged social groups, fail to live up to their public mission.

Leadership needed
New Zealand universities need to look hard at these issues. In today’s political and media environment, the challenge of mis- and disinformation is only going to intensify. Institutional culture, practices and policies need to account for this.

And universities have barely begun to address the reality that campuses are often experienced as hostile spaces by minority groups, not least Māori and Pacific staff and students.

A genuine democratisation of university life — including tackling institutional racism — is also vital to ensure all communities in Aotearoa New Zealand can see themselves as participants in and beneficiaries of what universities do. Principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi should not only be acknowledged but given meaningful expression.

Hard work will be required for our universities to become highly trusted institutions by all communities. This is especially true of tangata whenua and Pacific people.

In fact, our tertiary institutions have a lot to learn from tangata whenua about handling disagreements and responding to unethical behaviour in a way that upholds the mana of all involved.

We would do well to take a lead from legal scholar Moana Jackson who has envisioned universities as “a marae ātea where robust debate and criticism should flourish”, but also as “a whare where relationships should be nurtured and enhanced, and where all students and staff should feel safe and free”.

To realise such a vision will require clear-headed and courageous leadership at all levels within our universities.

Dr Matheson Russell is associate professor of philosophy, University of Auckland. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.