The spirit of unanimity in which the United Nations Security Council passed resolution 2334 on December 23 stands in sharp contrast to the condemnation and accusations that have dominated subsequent commentary from Israel and that country's supporters.
New Zealanders deserve to know why the issue of settlements has become so challenging, and why it came before the council in December 2016.
At the heart of this whole debate is whether we will see a future in which two states, Israel and Palestine, live side by side in peace and security. This two state solution has been the accepted basis for resolving the Palestinian question for many decades now, enshrined in various negotiated accords and UN Security Council resolutions, and the focus for several unsuccessful attempts to broker final agreement between the parties,
The most recent attempt was led by US Secretary of State John Kerry. After showing great promise those talks broke down in 2014.
No one should underestimate the challenges associated with negotiating the terms for a two state solution. Significant compromises are required of both sides, and the domestic political challenges for both are formidable.
But there has been agreement in principle on the key components, security guarantees for Israel and a state for Palestinians based on the 1967 borders but with negotiated land swaps, including a negotiated approach to managing Jerusalem's holy sites. Resolution 2334 reinforces the international community's commitment to this negotiated outcome.
Resolution 2334 condemns the obstacles to a negotiated two state solution: incitement and acts of violence and terror against civilians of all sides, and the ongoing settlements programme which carves ever more deeply into the land available for a Palestinian state on the West Bank.
There have been some misleading and irresponsible claims made by critics of the resolution: that it somehow predetermines negotiations between the parties, affects the rights of Israelis to access certain religious sites, or changes the legal status of the West Bank. None of those claims is correct. New Zealand would not have supported it if those assertions were correct, and the US would most certainly not have allowed the resolution to pass.
The focal point for much of the critics' anger is the direct call for a halt to the settlements. But that call by the council was clear and deliberate because continuing settlement growth at anything like the current rate will render the two state solution a purely academic concept. There will be nothing left to negotiate.
The other reality is that without a two state solution, demographic and security considerations will pose a serious challenge to the future character of Israel. Kerry put it starkly in his statement the week after the adoption of Resolution 2334, "If the choice is one state, Israel can either be Jewish or democratic - it cannot be both - and it won't ever really be at peace."
Those who doubt the seriousness of the settlements issue should read the report of the Middle East Quartet of July 1, 2016. The Quartet comprises the European Union, Russia, the United Nations and the United States. Its report outlines in a careful and factual way the impact of ongoing settlement activity, and more recent moves by the Israeli Parliament to retrospectively legalise settlements developed in contravention of Israeli law.
In Israel this is a politically difficult topic. The settler movement is very influential in the current government, and its leaders occupy a number of key Cabinet posts.
For the whole of New Zealand's two year term on the Security Council, the Secretary-General and his Special Co-ordinator have expressed alarm that the forces of incitement and violence and the relentless progress of the settlement programme were undermining the two state solution.
Some quite exotic theories have been advanced as to why this resolution was dealt with in the final month of New Zealand's council membership. The truth is: the United States would not accept any resolution on this topic until after US presidential elections in November. The domestic politics would have been too difficult.
In late 2014 three quarters of the countries in the United Nations voted for New Zealand's election to the Security Council. They did so because New Zealand has a long standing and respected record for fairness. They also knew of New Zealand's long standing bi-partisan support for the two state solution as a basis for resolving the Palestinian question.
Against that background it would be very difficult to explain why we would not support a resolution seeking to reinforce the notion of two states living peacefully, side by side, and which called for an end to the incitement, violence and the settlements that pose such a serious threat to it.
| Murray McCully Foreign Affairs | January 12, 2017 |
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WELLINGTON, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- New Zealand Trade Minister Todd McClay will be in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) next week in another bid to finalize a free trade agreement (FTA) with the Gulf states.
MClay said Friday he would be pressing for a conclusion to the negotiations between New Zealand and the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which began back in 2009.
McClay would meet bilaterally with ministerial counterparts and business leaders, including UAE Minister of Economy Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansoor and Kuwaiti Minister of Commerce Khalid Nasser Al Roudhan.
"This is my third visit to the region since becoming trade minister and it is important that we continue to lobby for the conclusion of the agreement. Progress on a GCC FTA will offer greater opportunity for New Zealand companies in this highly competitive market," McClay said in a statement.
The GCC comprising Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman was New Zealand's eighth largest trading partner, with annual two-way trade exceeding 3.5 billion NZ dollars (2.49 billion U.S. dollars).
In September last year, New Zealand and Saudi Arabian leaders appeared to have overcome stumbling blocks towards a long-anticipated FTA, after McClay held talks with Saudi Minister of Commerce and Investment Dr Majid bin Abdullah Al Qasabi and they agreed to work towards its early completion.
In 2015, then New Zealand Prime Minister John Key visited the GCC states, and said Saudi Arabia was going to be the stumbling block to the deal.
It was believed that Saudi government took umbrage over New Zealand's ban on exports of live sheep a trade in which Saudi businesses had invested heavily.
McClay would travel to Switzerland on Jan. 19 and 20 to attend a meeting of key World Trade Organization (WTO) trade ministers to discuss developments in the multilateral trading system and prospects for progress ahead of the 11th WTO Ministerial meeting in Buenos Aires.
| A SINA release | January 13, 2017 |
The Reserve Bank has appointed Klarissa Plimmer as Chief Information Officer and Patrick Hoerler as Head of Risk Assessment and Assurance.
As Chief Information Officer, Klarissa Plimmer is responsible for the Bank's information management and technology. Ms Plimmer was previously the Director ICT Solution Delivery at the New Zealand Defence Force, and has worked in a number of ICT leadership roles at the BNZ for 13 years.
Patrick Hoerler heads the Bank's Risk Assessment and Assurance unit, which is responsible for ensuring that financial, operational, and reputational risks faced by the Bank are identified, monitored and managed in line with best practice. The unit includes the Bank's internal audit function and legal services.
Before joining the Bank Mr Hoerler was the Risk Assurance Officer for Mercury (formerly Mighty River Power and Mercury Energy) and was previously their treasurer. Mr Hoerler has a background in international banking, working with Credit Suisse and Zurich Kantonalbank in the US and Asia before migrating to New Zealand to work as treasurer for ENZA and in banking with HSBC.
| A RBNZ release | January 13, 2017 |
∩ Opinion: Resolution 2334 - Preserving the two state solution
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Lieutenant Tom Gilbert is leading a 35-member New Zealand Defence Force engineering contingent that left today for the Sinai Peninsula to build a security fence for an international peacekeeping force. In high school, Tom Gilbert led fellow students.
Now the former deputy head boy of Central Hawke’s Bay College is leading a 35-member New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) engineering contingent bound for the Sinai Peninsula.
“It is a massive honour to lead NZDF personnel on operations overseas,” Lieutenant Gilbert, a Troop Commander in the New Zealand Army’s 2nd Field Squadron, said.“A position of leadership comes with a unique set of challenges, which I very much look forward to. Every officer aspires to lead soldiers on operations and few get this opportunity.
“I am very humbled to be chosen to lead the contingent. It is my last year of troop command, so this deployment is the perfect way to finish my term as troop commander.”
Lieutenant Gilbert is leading a contingent comprising combat engineers, carpenters, plumbers, maintenance fitters and electricians from the New Zealand Army’s 2nd Engineer Regiment. The contingent left this morning to build a security fence around the Multinational Force and Observers’ (MFO) South Camp over the next six months.
The MFO is an international organisation with peacekeeping responsibilities in the Sinai Peninsula. After operating at North Camp for more than 30 years, the mission’s headquarters and a number of troops from the 12 nations that make up the MFO’s Force moved to South Camp in mid-2016 because of the deteriorating security situation in North Sinai.
The MFO is building new facilities to accommodate the influx into South Camp and requested assistance from New Zealand and other countries with some of the infrastructure projects.
“I had my sights set on becoming an engineer, and leading sappers on operations exceeds any expectations I had when I joined,” said Lieutenant Gilbert, 23, who enlisted in the Army in 2012 straight from high school.
A number of his relatives served in the Army and the Navy and he regularly heard captivating stories of their wartime experiences while growing up.
“My soldiers motivate me to do well in my role. As troop commander, my success has a direct impact on them,” he said.
“My family has been extremely supportive and that is another big motivation for me. We have a strong history with the military and I work hard to succeed in my role to honour them and make them proud.”
| An NZDF release | January 13, 2017 |
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Though still in the prototype stage, EMPA is currently looking for commercial partners to assist in creating a compact version of the system for household domestic use(Credit: EMPA)
Making the move away from using fossil fuels for heating is a necessary part of creating a sustainable future, but it's often a difficult ask for many people when turning up a thermostat on a gas or electric heater provides instant, trouble-free warmth. If people are to be convinced to switch to more renewable sources, it makes sense that there need to be easy-to-use systems available to encourage them to do so. A group of Swiss researchers claim to have come up with a process that stores heat captured during summer for easy, flick-of-a-switch use in winter, with the added benefit that the captured energy can be physically transported anywhere it may be needed.
Created by researchers working at EMPA (Eidgenössische Materialprüfungs-und ForschungsAnstalt or, in English, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research), the new system uses concentrated sodium hydroxide (NaOH) as the thermal storage medium, and a collection of largely off-the-shelf components to capture, convert, and release heat energy on demand.
To achieve this, the researchers rely on the fact that when water is poured onto dry sodium hydroxide an exothermic reaction ensues, where the chemical energy contained in the NaOH is released as heat. As NaOH is also extremely hygroscopic (that is, having a great attraction for dragging in and holding water molecules from the surrounding environment), more heat is produced from water condensing from vapor in the air and the sodium hydroxide solution is heated even further. In this way, large amounts of heat may be liberated from NaOH simply by the addition of water.
Conversely, if heat energy (collected from the sun, for example) is fed into a solution of sodium hydroxide diluted with water, the moisture readily evaporates and the NaOH solution becomes more concentrated and, therefore, effectively stores the supplied energy. This concentrated mixture may then be kept stored for many months (even years), until the heat is once again liberated when the NaOH is exposed to water again. The solution can also be easily transported in tanks to other areas where heat energy is needed.
In practice, the storage medium is a viscous liquid composed of a 50 percent NaOH solution that is made to trickle along in a spiral pipe (created from heat exchangers normally found in instantaneous water heaters), where it soaks up water vapor along the way and then conveys the generated heat into the pipe. The heat is then free to radiate, convect, and conduct into the area requiring warmth.
During this process, the sodium hydroxide solution cascades down the outside of the heat exchanger spiral, where it is diluted to around 30 percent in the steamy atmosphere of the inside of the system, and the water temperature within the pipe rises to around 50° C (122° F). Which, in a happy coincidence, makes it ideal for under floor heating.
The reverse of this process – passing heat through the medium to store energy – has also been demonstrated in the system. Specifically, the moisture from the NaOH solution evaporates when heat is applied, which is then siphoned off and condensed. The solution that exits the heat exchanger is now back up to 50 percent strength, and "charged" with heat energy. The researchers suggest that the heat for this step could be renewably produced using solar collectors (similar to those used in solar-powered air conditioning systems).
The heated water generated in the process of condensation is then transferred to a geothermal probe (generally loops of pipes embedded vertically in the ground) for storage and retrieval. After the stored condensation's temperature has dropped to somewhere between 5 and 10° C (41 to 50° F) it is returned to the apparatus to drain the store.
Though still in the prototype stage, EMPA is currently looking for commercial partners to assist in creating a compact version of the system for household domestic use.
The EMPA heat storage device is one of three competing systems in the COMTES project, which has the goal to develop and demonstrate compact seasonal storage of solar thermal energy.
| A Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Testing and Research (EMPA) release | January 12, 2017 |
With few exceptions, governments across Europe do not like Donald Trump’s policies. As he prepares to enter the White House, the U.S. president-elect has already spoken extensively about making America great again. In particular, his economic policies seem protectionist, and his foreign policy, particularly with regard to Israel and Russia, will pose serious challenges to the EU. But instead of moaning about what is still Europe’s greatest ally, EU leaders should respond to the new administration in several ways.
These responses are not about countering U.S. influence, which would be impossible in any case. They are about understanding why and how the EU has to become a serious player in its own right and stop wanting the United States to keep fixing things. It’s time the EU started fixing its own house.
First are defense and security. Because the EU is not going to have its own viable defense structures in the foreseeable future, the European members of NATO will have to spend more on defense. This is about protecting their own citizens and their democracies.
This cannot be overestimated. The European allies have to be able to defend NATO’s Eastern and Southern members—not simply use the rhetoric of reassurance. Whether it is against Russian hybrid warfare, terrorism, or cyberattacks, NATO’s European allies, along with the EU, have to step up their cooperation and capabilities.
Second, the EU and NATO have to spell out their goals for their Eastern neighbors. Economic support for Ukraine and closer ties with Moldova and Georgia are not enough. These moves have to be underpinned by a political commitment that sets out the objective of the EU’s relationship with these neighbors. Postponing this issue will lead to a vacuum that Russia is all too keen to exploit and fill to ensure that this region will be Russia’s sphere of influence, not Europe’s.
Third, if Trump is true to his word about moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and supporting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s settlement policy, one can only guess how the Palestinians will react.
The EU, which has played a miserable role in the Middle East and given billions of euros of aid to the Palestinians without much political impact or strategy, will be reduced to damage limitation. In practice, this means promoting stabilization policies that would focus on economic, social, and judicial issues. The EU’s influence will continue to be extremely limited.
The fourth issue is trade. The EU is in no position to adopt protectionist policies, even though that has been the reflex of populist and antiglobalization movements. Many member states that pay lip service to a more open trade policy oppose ratifying important trade agreements with Canada, Japan, Singapore, and, in the future, New Zealand. They want to protect their own markets.
But trade is not only about reducing tariffs; it is also about influence. Trade is about consolidating ties with like-minded countries, such as Canada and New Zealand, that hold the same values as Europe.
If Trump wants to pursue his protectionist policies, the EU should exploit that by speeding up trade accords. Yes, national parliaments will be able to veto such deals if they step outside the powers of the European Commission, which has the exclusive right to negotiate and implement trade accords provided they are only trade-related. But the commission has tended to stick to its powers rather than go for so-called mixed agreements that require member-state involvement. This is a big opportunity for the EU to counter U.S. protectionism. It is a big opportunity to knit alliances.
Finally, it’s time for EU leaders in Brussels to remind all member states why the EU was founded and what it is based on. It is a community of values based above all on solidarity and tolerance, media freedom, decency, and human rights. This is why countries—whether former fascist states or those with a military junta such as Spain, Portugal, and Greece or the former Communist states of Central and Eastern Europe—joined the EU in the first place. They knew they were delegating some of their sovereignty to Brussels in return for a special kind of solidarity.
If Poland, Hungary, or other countries reject these values, then they should pay some price in terms of access to the EU’s structural funds for poorer regions or even voting rights. Despite its remoteness from citizens and its inability and unwillingness to get out of the Brussels bubble, the EU cannot afford for its members to reject the fundamental values that they signed up to. And if EU leaders such as Czech President Miloš Zeman have praise only for the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, EU leaders should ask why.
In short, whining about Trump only gives the impression that the EU knows better or has the moral high ground. Both have still to be proved.
| AJudy Dempsey's Strategic Europe article | January 12, 2017 |
An astounding selection of global wine imbibers and influencers will descend on the nation’s capital this month for New Zealand’s most significant wine event, Pinot Noir NZ 2017.
The sold out event includes a line-up of 30 speakers from Japan, the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand, who are tasked with sparking thought-provoking discussions among 600 Pinot Noir lovers from 20 different countries.
Spearheading the line-up are the world’s most influential wine writer Jancis Robinson OBE, MW, the world’s only Master of Wine and Sake Ken Ohashi and Tool frontman and winery owner Maynard James Keenan.
The event will champion diverse communicators and innovative thought. Wine writer and sonic artist Jo Burzynska will consider how wine can be enjoyed in a multi-sensory environment; renowned American writer Elaine Chukan Brown will explore the overall concept of future communication, and award-winning Australian Andrea Frost will discuss new styles of engagement and communication with wine lovers.
These global wine guru’s will be accompanied by a strong kiwi contingent to tell the New Zealand Pinot Noir story to the world. National treasures include New Zealander of the Year, Dame Anne Salmond, awarded for her contribution to New Zealand cultural history, and Rachel Taulelei, CEO of Kono NZ, one of the New Zealand’s food industry champions. Together they will talk about what binds us to our land and our connection to it over time.
Joining them will be four New Zealand Masters of Wine; Jane Skilton, Emma Jenkins and Michael Brajkovich, along with New Zealand’s newest MW Stephen Wong.
The event will be peppered with our own great Pinot Noir creators, including Larry McKenna, Blair Walter and winemaker/actor Sam Neill. They will evoke a home grown yet international perspective of New Zealand’s place in the world of wine, through the eyes of the Pinot Noir grape.
Pinot Noir NZ is held every four years, and will take place on the Wellington waterfront from 31st January to 2nd February. It has fast become one of the best Pinot Noir events on the planet, showcasing 115 wineries, with over 600 wines to 600 visionaries, industry leaders, influencers and pure lovers of Pinot Noir.
| A Pinot Noir NZ 2017 release | January 12, 2017 |
BCDS Group has been appointed master distributor for Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Rim region by labelling automation manufacturer FOX IV Technologies.
FOX IV systems will be offered through ALS (Auto ID Labelling Solutions), a BCDS company, which is headed up by Bill Boursianis who has had more than 10 years’ experience with both FOX IV products and other printing and labelling equipment.
BCDS Group was selected due to their technical expertise, regional sales and service coverage, as well their ability to provide complete solutions from supplies to installation.
“BCDS’s expertise in integrating barcode, auto-ID and RFID equipment made them an excellent fit for representing FOX IV,” said Rick Fox, President and CEO.
“It was clear that they share our commitment to our customers in Australia, New Zealand and the region. Through BCDS, FOX IV customers can continue to expect quality equipment as well as knowledgeable support and service.”
Ian Jefford, Managing Director of BCDS, concurred. “This new appointment by FOX IV comes with much excitement within the BCDS Group, allowing us to further succeed on our business purpose of making our clients lives easier,” he said.
Over the past 20 years, more than 1000 FOX IV print and apply systems have been installed in Australia. BCDS will provide parts and service for existing FOX IV equipment as well as supply new FOX IV equipment, including the 2010 Series and FOX IV’s innovative Zebra based print and apply systems.
| A Ferret release | January 11, 2017 |
Palace of the Alhambra, Spain
By: Charles Nathaniel Worsley (1862-1923)
From the collection of Sir Heaton Rhodes
Oil on canvas - 118cm x 162cm
Valued $12,000 - $18,000
Offers invited over $9,000
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242
Mount Egmont with Lake
By: John Philemon Backhouse (1845-1908)
Oil on Sea Shell - 13cm x 14cm
Valued $2,000-$3,000
Offers invited over $1,500
Contact: Henry Newrick – (+64 ) 27 471 2242