Geoffrey Miller

It could have been worse – but it could have been better. That was the message from New Zealand’s trade and finance ministers in their initial response to Donald Trump’s new, higher ‘reciprocal tariff’. New Zealand exporters of most goods to the United States now face a 15 per cent import duty, a significant increase on the 10 per cent ‘baseline’ figure in place since April. A stony-faced Nicola Willis, the finance minister, called Trump’s move a ‘disappointing development’, arguing that New Zealand had suffered from the application of a ‘very blunt formula which does not take account of the...

Israel’s strikes against Iran will form the backdrop to New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s upcoming trip to China. Speaking in the immediate aftermath of the strikes at a scheduled press conference on Friday, Luxon characterised the strikes by Israel as ‘potentially catastrophic for the Middle East’, observing ‘the last thing this region needs is more instability’. Adding to Luxon’s woes, oil prices initially surged by some 10 per cent after the Israeli strikes on Friday, signalling upcoming pain at the petrol pump for New Zealand consumers. Luxon has built his first-term government on easing cost-of-living pressures, but further escalation...

For the first time in a decade, a New Zealand Prime Minister is heading to the Middle East. The trip is more than just a courtesy call. New Zealand PMs frequently change planes in Dubai en route to destinations elsewhere. But Christopher Luxon’s visit to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) this week will be the first time since 2015 that a New Zealand Prime Minister has embarked on a visit to the Middle East itself. Much has changed in the region since John Key, also from Luxon’s centre-right National Party, visited the Gulf in April 2015. This includes some of...

Donald Trump’s sweeping election victory has set the stage for this year’s APEC summit in Peru. At least 14 leaders have so far confirmed their attendance at the leaders’ summit in Lima from November 15-16. China’s Xi Jinping, Japan’s new Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba and Canada’s Justin Trudeau will all be in Peru – as will New Zealand’s Prime Minister Christopher Luxon. Peru is a particularly enthusiastic Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum member and is hosting events for the third time since it joined in 1998. The 2024 meeting shares one important parallel with previous APEC gatherings held in Peru...

New Zealand’s new free trade agreement with the Gulf Cooperation Council is a major win for both sides. Todd McClay, New Zealand’s trade minister, announced the long-awaited deal on Thursday with his counterparts in Doha, Qatar. It is a remarkable, yet also surprising sudden success: the genesis of the agreement lies in talks that began in 2006. The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) is made up of six countries that are among the world’s richest – Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). For New Zealand, the Gulf states are both highly lucrative markets in themselves,...

Change is coming to America. Next month’s elections are likely to pave the way for an overhaul of US foreign policy– regardless of whether Donald Trump or Kamala Harris wins the presidency. Decisions made in Washington will also have a direct impact on Wellington. While the Biden administration started its term with a strong, even dominant focus on the Indo-Pacific, Washington has inevitably become preoccupied by turmoil elsewhere – most recently in the Middle East, where a wider regional war centred on Iran and Israel is arguably already underway. One year on from the October 7 attacks by Hamas, there...

New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are moving closer together – at record pace. Just a year after agreeing to enter initial talks, Wellington and Abu Dhabi have concluded negotiations on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (or CEPA for short). The deal will go down as one of New Zealand’s fastest trade negotiations. It is arguably the biggest breakthrough for New Zealand’s relations with the Middle East since negotiations began in 2006 on a wider free trade agreement (FTA) with the six-country Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The CEPA is not a substitute for the wider deal with the...

New Zealand is not just on the same page, but is now in lockstep with Australia. That was the general theme of keynote foreign policy address by New Zealand’s Prime Minister to a Sydney thinktank on Thursday. Christopher Luxon’s 20-minute speech took a decisively hawkish tone. The Lowy Institute address restated and reiterated recent positioning both from Winston Peters, his foreign minister, and from a similar speech that Luxon had given in Tokyo in June. Indeed, Luxon was lavish in his praise for Peters, who he said was ‘among the most activist and impactful of New Zealand’s foreign ministers in...

As tensions in the Middle East rise further, New Zealand’s approach to the region continues to evolve. Neither Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, nor foreign minister Winston Peters were immediately keen to comment publicly about Israel’s assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran. On social media, Luxon instead promoted the Government’s recently introduced tax cuts, while Peters posted on the launch of a new shortwave radio transmitter for Radio New Zealand’s Pacific-focused service, a key plank of Wellington’s public diplomacy efforts. But it would be wrong to call New Zealand reticent when it comes to the war in Gaza...