Former Australian foreign minister Bob Carr plans to sue New Zealand Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters over controversial remarks made on radio during a recent debate over the Advanced Nuclear Weapons Enhanced Cooperation (AUKUS) pact.
Peters was interviewed about New Zealand’s position on AUKUS and accused Carr of closeness with China.
The comments were not republished, but one remark has been repeated in New Zealand Question Time under parliamentary privilege.
Carr’s office confirmed that he is taking legal action.
Peters is the deputy prime minister of New Zealand and the foreign minister and leader of NZ First, one of the three parties that make up the country’s coalition government.
Opposition leader Chris Hipkins has called for Peters to be stood down, stating that the allegations against Carr are unacceptable and that Peters has abused his office as minister of foreign affairs.
The opposition is calling for Peters to be stood down immediately.
The history of Bob Carr and China has questions to answer. He has faced harsh opposition from within his party:
Former NSW premier Bob Carr is facing demands he be expelled from Labor because of his links to China, a sign that the relationship some within the NSW division of the party have established with donors connected to Beijing is causing deep unease among the rank and file.
Carr also founded the Australia-China Relations Institute at UBS, using a grant from Huang Xiangmo, the same gentleman behind the demise of Sam Dastayari and Aldi bags of cash mysteriously appearing in certain ALP offices.
The Institute was caned by John Fitzgerald is an emeritus professor in the Centre for Social Impact at Swinburne University of Technology:
Carr’s institute may outgrow its early links with the Communist Party’s Propaganda Bureau and start to tell all kinds of China stories – good, bad and indifferent – while working to build greater trust between the two countries. On recent evidence from China it is hard to see that happening while Carr remains at the helm.
Huang Xiangmo was ultimately exiled from Australia.
New Zealand is currently debating whether to join AUKUS. Peter’s summed up his view of Carr’s contribution:
“What on Earth does he think he’s doing walking into our country and telling us what to do? We would no more do that in Australia than he should do here. That’s the kind of arrogance we don’t like.”
