Dr Keith Suter: Channel Seven foreign editor on the presence of the Chinese warships in the Tasman Sea

The presence of Chinese warships in the Tasman Sea could indicate New Zealand needs to strengthen relations with China.

The Defence Force is monitoring three warships that have now entered Australia's exclusive economic zone, south of Tasmania.

Acting Prime Minister David Seymour says there's no reason to panic - but it shows how the world's changed. 

Channel Seven's foreign editor, Dr Keith Suter, says China hasn't violated international law. 

"It doesn point up to the fact that we need agreements between Australia, New Zealand and China on how the Chinese should behave when they're in our corner of the world."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's all happening on the China front today, Winston Peter's

(00:02):
meeting with China's foreign minister. This is one year. This
is happening tonight at around ten o'clock our time. Details
continued to leak around this Cook's deal. Apparently China has
insisted that the Cooks not attend any bilateral or multilateral
meetings international meetings without Beijing's say so. That reporting from

(00:22):
Richard Harmon at Politic. Meanwhile, three warships have re entered
Australia's Exclusive economic zone off the coast of Hobart. Dr
Keith Suter is with Channel seventies, Australia's foreign editor there
and international relations expert Keith good Evening.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
Yes's good evening, Ryan.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
First of all, entering your ez, is that a big deal?

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Well, they have a right to do that. There's been
no violation of international law. They've caused all sorts of
problems in the way in which they've conducted themselves, but
they haven't actually violated international law. And at the time
they were carrying out the live firing drills, they were
on these high seas between Australia and New Zealand. But
it does point up to the need that we need

(01:03):
to get agreement between Australia and New Zealand and China
on how the Chinese behave when they're in our corner
of the world.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Reporting that the Cook Islands is being going to be
prevented by their own signing from attending any international or
multi national multilateral meetings without Beijing say so, what do
you make of that?

Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yes, I'm intrigued by that. There has been an agreement
signed in the last few weeks between the Chinese and
Mark Brown, the Prime Minister of the Cook Islands, on
what's called the Blue Economy, which will give China access
to the marine reserves and environment around the Cook Islands,
which is a huge area. Of course, Cook Islands only

(01:46):
have a very small population, a resident population about fifteen
Thousand's actually got more living Cook Islanders in New Zealand
than there are back on the Cook Islands. But they've
got a huge amount of the Pacific Ocean for which
they're responsible adopted this new agreement. Now, how much more
the Cook Islands is going to sign over to China.
It's very worrying.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
Indeed, absolutely, thanks so much for your time, Keith suit
it with us. He's Channel seven, Australia's foreign editor and
international relations expert thirteen minutes after five. Just so that
you know, this is from Richard Harmond's report. He says,
in addition to this requirement, that they consult with Beijing
on you know, before they go and have a meeting
with someone else from around the world. Another the other

(02:26):
one that's raising eyebrows in this action plan is that
the two countries provide support to the candidates of each
of the other two countries during the elections of various
boards and committees of the organizations to which we both belong.
So you can imagine, I don't know, someone's running to
be the head of the UN or something, and you're

(02:46):
basically committing to supporting each other. This say Country Inside
the Realm of New Zealand. For more from Heather Duplessy
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