The Nation interviewed Metiria Turei yesterday: Turei: Key misled public over jihadi brides. She accused John Key of ‘lying by omission’.
The Green Party co-leader Metiria Turei says the Prime Minister John Key the so-called Kiwi “jihadi brides” left from Australia, not New Zealand, six months before the first claims were made – and failed to correct the record after the story became public.
On 8 December John Key said “in my view no question that have been one or two people that have left and it would appear on all of the factors that we know that they are going as Jihadist brides”.
At the time the news was presented as “Kiwi women are joining the Islamic State to become Jihadi brides”.
Last Month (17 March) it was revealed that while they were New Zealanders travelling on New Zealand passports they had left from Australia.
Key said “whether someone leaves from Australia, from New Zealand, could leave from New Zealand, might leave from New Zealand , in my mind they are all New Zealanders.
I don’t think it has been revealed how long they had been in Australia before leaving for the Middle East.
Key has said he doesn’t think he owes New Zealand Muslim women an apology.
Turei claims that Key ‘lied by omission’ – that could be seen as a lame political accusation, all politicians could be accused of lying by not revealing everything they know. She also said she had new information.
Metiria Turei: So we have found out, the green party has found out that John Key knew in May of last year that no New Zealand women had left New Zealand to go to Iraq or Syria. He had been told that one New Zealand woman from elsewhere, from Australia, had gone, but there was no information about why she had gone, and certainly it was very clear that this New Zealand woman had not left from New Zealand.
He and Chris Finlayson both knew that as a fact, and yet at the Select Committee in later on in the year in November he made it seem to the whole country that there were New Zealand women leaving New Zealand, radicalised to become the wives of Islamic fighters.
It was completely untrue and he knew it in November when he was at that select committee meeting.
Lisa Owen: So just to be clear, you’re saying he spoke at the select committee, and when he gave interviews after the select committee, he’d known for six months that none of the so called Jihadi brides had actually left from this country.
Metiria Turei: Well that’s right, he allowed New Zealand to think that there were increasing numbers of women in New Zealand being radicalised in New Zealand and leaving to marry Islamic fighters.
He had no information on which to make that assumption, and that is lying by omission.
That is a Prime Minister who is scaremongering, and driving up fear and suspicion, about what is actually a very vulnerable group of New Zealanders in the current circumstances
Key may be guilty of overstating the situation, and allowing media to overstate the situation uncorrected.
Turei could be overstating her case a tad as well.
Lisa Owen: So you’re saying our Prime Minister lied.
Metiria Turei: Yes. Our Prime Minister lied to the country. He could have clarified at the Select Committee that these were, they may have been New Zealand women but they were leaving from Australia, he could have clarified immediately after the Select Committee when he was asked about it by the media, and he could have clarified it in all the time between November and March this year when he was finally found out that these women weren’t leaving from New Zealand. There is not that radicalisation happening here.
But that’s not certain either.
Lisa Owen: But the thing is, nothing the Prime Minister said was untrue, so tell me why he’s wrong.
Metiria Turei: Well but this is where you get to lying by omission. You know he’s the Prime Minister, he has a responsibility to make sure New Zealanders have accurate information about what is a incredibly serious issue.
The issues of terrorism, of Islamic State, the fear of radicalisation, we see the bombings and things on the news, people are really concerned about this stuff. And rightly so. So he has a responsibility to make sure that we have accurate and transparent information, and he deliberately kept information from New Zealanders in order, in order to drive up fear and suspicion amongst us, amongst our own communities, about each other.
Turei is doing what she has accused Key of doing. She hasn’t proven Key deliberately kept information from us. She hasn’t proven Key has deliberately tried to drive up fear and suspicion.
But Turei appears to be deliberately trying to drive up suspicion about Key’s actions (or inactions) and motives.
They play an interview response from Key two weeks ago:
John Key: There’s nothing to correct. The point is not about where they leave from. The point is are they New Zealanders. If they’re New Zealanders under the New Zealand intelligence law the only salient point is are they New Zealanders.
Back to yesterday:
Lisa Owen: Nothing to correct he says. Your response?
Metiria Turei: He’s absolutely wrong. He allowed New Zealanders to think there were Muslim women in New Zealand being radicalised and leaving here to marry Islamic fighters. He, that was wrong. That information is completely wrong. He should have been clear about that.
I think Turei is taking this too far. It’s fair to question why Key didn’t provide clarification and more details. But it’s a big step from that to say he was “completely wrong”. It was the media and Turei who seem to have got it wrong based on incomplete information.
Lisa Owen: We don’t know where they were radicalised though.
Metiria Turei: We don’t know if they were. We don’t know, even Rebecca Kitteridge, head of the SIS, said she doesn’t, they don’t know why the women from Australia were leaving to go to Iraq and Syria.
So there’s a lack of detail known, but Turei claims that Key was “completely wrong” and “lying by omission”. He can’t say what he doesn’t know.
Metiria Turei: We do know that there are people who may be going to visit their families for example and then come home.
I think it’s safe to assume very few if any people would want to go to Syria to visit their families at present. “We know that” and “who may be” is meaningless.
Metiria Turei: There’s no evidence, he had no evidence that they were radicalised or going to marry Islamic fighters.
Lisa Owen: But we know that they are New Zealand women.
Metiria Turei: They are women who hold the New Zealand passport. They as far as we know they are domiciled in Australia.
We don’t know that. I don’t think Turei knows that.
Metiria Turei: We don’t know how long they’ve been living in Australia. It could be for years and years. John Key allowed New Zealanders to think there was…
Lisa Owen: It could have been for five minutes. or it could be in transit heading off.
If the SIS wanted to know this it would be easy for them to find out when they last left New Zealand.
Lisa Owen: Do we not have reason to be concerned though, that these are women, New Zealand passports, heading off to areas where there is this conflict going on?
Metiria Turei: We need to know more information. This is the problem. This is what John Key’s statement does. It creates more questions, and more fear and concern, and then will not provide accurate to address those.
Turei seems to be claiming there is insufficient information known, but that Key is not providing enough information. Information that isn’t known?
Metiria Turei: This is why that select committee, that committee that John Key was on, needs a much broader representation from Parliamentarians, like the Greens, like other political parties, so we can question and get this information out from Ministers and from the SIS, because everybody deserves to know more and to have more accurate information. John key didn’t provide it.
Information that Turei says the head of the SIS and John Key don’t have. So how would more members on the committee find out more?
It looks like the Greens would love to be on the Security Select Committee. Is that the reason for Turei’s indignation on this? Accusing Key of lying by omission is not going to help her case to be put on the committee.
A committee that is bound by security and secrecy to not reveal everything.
Lisa Owen: Wo wo wo who’s responsibility was it to correct the misinformation though, because you said that Mr Finlayson knew, and of course Rebecca Kitteridge knew, so who’s to blame, should Rebecca Kitteridge have spoken up?
Metiria Turei: She should, ah she may well have been blind sided at that Select Committee, and John Key certainly threw her under a bus when he told you actually that she was the first person to raise Jihadi brides. He lied about that as well.
It was Kitteridge who was being questioned by the Select Committee, not Key.
Metiria Turei:But John Key knew, Rebecca Kitteridge knew, and Chris Finlayson all knew that these women were not leaving from New Zealand, and at any time they could have told us and they did not. We had to go and, radio New Zealand had to go and find that information, the Greens have been going out to find that information, accurate information for new Zealanders.
But the main issue, still, is that there is very limited information publicly known.
Lisa Owen:But aren’t the spy agencies being more open than ever with us now?
Metiria Turei: Well no, actually no they’re not.
I think she’s wrong on that. We can argue about whether they tell us enough or not, but there’s certainly more openness now than ever before.
Metiria Turei:You know I have reports of SIS agents going to people’s homes and telling them that they are being watched, frightening people. I’m investigating that now because I think that’s very serious. Communities, all our communities in New Zealand need to feel safe. Safe because we are getting accurate information.
Making information about who the SIS are watching public won’t help people feel safe.
Does Turei not want the SIS to watch or investigate anyone? That’s what they are supposed to do, within reason and within the law, to help keep us safe.
Metiria Turei: Safe because we are getting accurate information. Safe because the agencies are doing a proper job. Safe because there’s a place to go if we have concerns. At the moment John Key is driving up fear and suspicion, and that makes it unsafe for everyone.
Except that key hasn’t kept bringing this issue up. Turei is promoting a fear and suspicion about ‘fear and suspicions’.
I think that most people in New Zealand don’t care much about what is happening in Syria and Iraq as long as it stays in Syria and Iraq.
Most New Zealanders probably don’t care whether a very small number of people leave from Australia on New Zealand passports headed for Syria or Iraq.
It looks to me like Turei is too busy promoting her own political agenda and is failing to ask important questions. One could say she is failing by omission.
If it’s known that women are leaving Australia on New Zealand passports for Syria or Iraq then I hope that our SIS is capable of finding out when those women were last in New Zealand.
It’s also worth considering whether it’s in the public interest in knowing what the SIS is doing, who they are watching and what the inter-country movements of people they are watching are.
Should we be given snippets of information, like the New Zealand women travelling to Syria and Iraq?
Should we be given no information and hope that our Security Intelligence Service is doing what it can, responsibly, to keep us safe?
Should the Greens have an MP on the Security and Intelligence Committee?
I think they are much more important questions than quibbling about whether Key omitted to reveal information when one of the complaints is that insufficient information is known.