Last week, 1 News broke the news of a major diplomatic rift between New Zealand and the Cook Islands, over the latter's plans to sign a "comprehensive strategic partnership agreement". Foreign Minister Winston Peters felt that he should have been consulted. Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown disagreed. So who's right?
Probably not Winston. Because while New Zealand explicitly had responsibility for "the external affairs and defence of the Cook Islands" at independence (and still does in New Zealand law), the situation has evolved. Over the past 60 years the Cook islands has increasingly been conducting its own foreign policy, joining various international bodies, and having bilateral diplomatic relations with over 60 other countries. New Zealand publicly recognises this fact, with MFAT saying "the Cook Islands conducts its own affairs", but that "New Zealand has a constitutional responsibility to respond to requests for assistance with foreign affairs, disasters and defence". In other words: the Cook Islands are their own country, they do their own thing, but as close friends (and former colonisers with ongoing obligations towards our victims) we have to help if asked.
In this case, they pretty obviously don't want our help. So New Zealand should just butt out. Or maybe try talking, rather than threatening. Because as with Kiribati, Winston's crude jerking of the colonial leash seems unlikely to make friends, and will likely be felt and remembered in the Cook Islands for a very long time. Especially when it is accompanied by the New Zealand media openly asking questions like "should New Zealand invade the Cook Islands?" - which seems to be an explicit invitation for the Cooks to seek the protection of a more powerful state like China.
Meanwhile, this has also highlighted another issue: because the New Zealand government is at this very moment in the process of passing a law which would allow them to prosecute any Cook Islands minister or official who made foreign policy decisions New Zealand doesn't like. The Crimes (Countering Foreign Interference) Amendment Bill creates a new criminal offence of improper conduct for or on behalf of foreign power, with extraterritorial jurisdiction, so that it applies to New Zealand citizens anywhere in the world. All Cook Islanders are New Zealand citizens, so it automatically applies to them. As for the criminal offence, China is a "foreign power", signing an agreement "in collaboration with... or agreement of" them is the very definition of "by and on behalf of", not telling MFAT about it meets the test to be "covert" or "deceptive", and thus "improper", and the government very clearly thinks it compromises the "protected new Zealand interests" of the security or defence and international relations of New Zealand. And while New Zealand diplomats and officials have an exemption for "the lawful performance of [their] functions or duties as an employee, contractor, authorised representative, or agent of" the NZ government, there's no such exemption for Cook Islands officials performing their functions in representing their country (likely due to colonial myopia: the metropole just doesn't think about its former colonies).
The Cook Islands Prime Minister should not face criminal charges on New Zealand for doing his job in a way that the New Zealand government does not like. And if the New Zealand government thinks that that is appropriate, then I think that that is a very ugly piece of colonialism, which can only further undermine the relationship between our two countries.
