Mike Treen: Stand up to Islamophobia - time to tell Trump-like demagogues to get lost!

An eye witness on Strickland Street, Christchurch, saw one of the suspects being apprehended by New Zealand police after today's attack on two mosques. She said police deliberately rammed the car. Video: RNZ


By Mike Treen, national director of Unite Union

After a beautiful day in which thousands of young people across Aotearoa marched for a better future, a chill has descended across this country.

Far-right murderers have shot innocent Muslims in their holy mosques and livestreamed it on Facebook and 4Chan.

The true face of fascism is revealed once again. This is what happens when you believe the lies that they merely want “free speech” to advocate their genocidal ideology.

They hate people of different ethnicities so much that they are prepared to commit terrorist crimes.

Now more than ever, we must stand up in our millions as the true people of Aotearoa, and fight racism, fascism and Islamophobia in all forms.

Where were the Pacific activists and independent media at climate summit?

Papua New Guinea’s Northern Province Governor Gary Juffa …he asked what about the climate
change activists and West Papuan advocates? Where were they? Image: David Robie/PMC

By David Robie at Te Papa

A recent Andy Marlette cartoon published by the Statesman Journal in Salem, Oregon, depicted a bathtub-looking Noah’s Ark with a couple of stony-faced elephants on board with a sodden sign declaring “Climate change is a hoax”.

The other animals on board floating to safety were muttering among themselves: “The elephants won’t admit that these 100-year events are happening once a month …”

At the other end of the globe in Wellington this week for the second Pacific Ocean Climate Conference at Te Papa Tongarewa Museum, I encountered a fatalistic message from a Tongan taxi driver counting down the hours before the tail-end of Tropical Cyclone Gita struck the New Zealand capital after wreaking a trail of devastation in Samoa, Tonga and Fiji.

He had it all worked out: “We don’t need climate conferences,” he said. “Just trust in God and we’ll survive.”

However, a key takeaway message from the three-day conference was just how urgent action is needed by global policymakers, especially for the frontline states in the Pacific – Kiribati, Marshall Islands and Tuvalu, where none of the sprawling atolls that make up those countries are higher than 2m above sea level.