- Agents from New Zealand’s national police force ransacked the home of a prominent independent journalist earlier this month who was collaborating with The Intercept on stories from the NSA archive furnished by Edward Snowden. The stated purpose of the 10-hour police raid was to identify the source for allegations that the reporter, Nicky Hager, recently published in a book that caused a major political firestorm and led to the resignation of a top government minister.
In August, one month before New Zealand’s national election, Hager published Dirty Politics, which showed that key figures in Prime Minister John Key’s National Party were feeding derogatory information about their opponents to a virulent right-wing blogger named Cameron Slater. Hager published evidence in the form of incriminating emails, provided by a hacker, demonstrating coordination between National Party officials and Slater. The ensuing scandal forced the resignation of a top Key ally, Justice Minister Judith Collins, and implicated numerous other National Party officials and supporters. Despite the scandal, the National Party won a resounding victory in the election, sending Key to a third term as prime minister.
There is some stuff from the wikipedia page entitled New_Zealand - United States relations. Such as and the New Zealand United States Council is something that the Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership probably had something of an influence on as well as the Kim Dotcom malarkey, as well. New Zealand is just another (kinda) ex-Britsh colony that will simper to the teat of US hegemony. The only reason they aren't in NATO is because of the A part. maybe.The Friends of New Zealand Congressional Caucus Member numbers now stand at 62.
It's more than the A part. We used to be in ANZUS but were turfed out because of our anti-nuclear stance. Then we were famously (in NZ) relegated to "friends but not allies." Successive Kiwi governments have since been trying to wrangle our way back into the US good books. Looks increasingly like the process is complete.