Locke Keith: Visiting Forces Bill — Second Reading 
Locke Keith: Visiting Forces Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:617;Page:12817] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party is supporting this bill which deals with the practical matters of how visiting forces to our country or our forces going to other countries conduct their affairs in order to have a degree of autonomy. It introduces certain cautions into arrangements made in that we do not want injustices done to those who are members of a visiting force or to New Zealanders and their property if that property is affected by activities of members from a visiting force. I think the way this bill is constructed is good. It is a base document upon which other status of forces agreements are constructed. In the base document most of the jurisdiction goes back to our country rather than is delegated to the visiting force except when there are issues between members of the visiting force that do not affect the people or property of New Zealand. 
The Minister in his speech talked about recognising what he called the sovereign immunity of the visiting force. I think that although we accept that sovereign immunity it does not mean that a country like New Zealand can wash its hands of injustices if they occur in terms of the processes of the visiting force. It is more a question of how those injustices are handled and as the Minister said those injustices are not handled so much by reference to a New Zealand court or by a New Zealand court superseding the internal proceedings of the visiting force as by negotiations between the New Zealand Government and the visiting force if we see that problems have arisen. The Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee of which I am a member said in its report that in an extreme case the Government could insist that the sending State withdrew its forces from New Zealand. 
I want to go a little bit into what problems could possibly arise in that respect. I can see about three of them. One is in terms of the penalty imposed by the visiting force against one of its members. There is a particular provision—an aspect of penalty—in the bill under clause 9(1) which states: “The service authorities of a visiting force must not—(a) impose or carry out a sentence of death in New Zealand;”. I think that that is very important because we as a country are very much against the death penalty. There could be a little problem there though or it could be quite a big problem for the person concerned in that while that provision prevents a sentence of death being imposed on the said offender in New Zealand that person could be whipped off back to China or some country such as that and be subject to the death penalty there. That is something we would have to watch very clearly and it could result in terminating that relationship with the visiting force. I think that that would be a severe breach of province. There could be other problems and I mention China and Singapore. Some countries have very harsh penalties and we would have to see whether they were being imposed in a way we would object to if they were offences effectively being committed on our territory. 
The second problem could be one of due process as I said. The bill envisages that one cannot appeal to a New Zealand court if it is a question of issues within the visiting force. But again we do have countries such as China and other countries like that which do not have particularly good due process. The Singaporean Government often does not process people through courts but it has an Internal Security Act. There are a lot of people languishing in its jails who have never been brought before a court. They have been there for years under that Internal Security Act. Many of the people in the so-called war against terrorism—I think all of them actually—who were detained up to about 3 or more years ago are sitting in jail. None of them have been processed for supposed terrorist charges. So there is a problem of due process in terms of visiting forces. One force could be the Singapore military force which has come to New Zealand sometimes for short periods of training in Waiouru etc. 
The third problem I can see is the possible mistreatment of those charged and detained in the visiting force while in New Zealand. A specific provision in the bill relates to an aspect of that. Clause 9(1)(b) states that the service authorities of a visiting force must not “do any act in New Zealand that would if done by a member of the Armed Forces of New Zealand constitute an offence against the Crimes of Torture Act 1989.” That unfortunately has a certain relevance right at this moment with the exposure of the systematic problems of in effect torture by American and British forces of people in Iraq. It is a whole systematic problem of abuse be it a combination of verbal abuse humiliation strippings etc. and including beatings. So there is that problem and we would have to make sure if there were a visiting force from for example the United States or Britain that its officers did not bring those practices to New Zealand in terms of their treatment of people serving in that visiting force. We would have to make sure they applied the proper provisions and did not descend into what could in some respects be seen as torture in their relationships. What seems to be happening in Iraq today as well as just a sort of revenge approach of beating up prisoners etc. is a whole strategy of how to get people to talk. That has originated from US military intelligence in particular but also includes British military intelligence personnel. They have been involved in some of the interrogations at the Abu Ghraibprison. The way one gets people to talk is to abuse them seriously. In effect one tortures them by sleep deprivation humiliates them and reduces their resistance to spilling the beans through that manner of abuse or one makes them live in fear through beatings. So there is that problem that could apply to a visiting force. 
I have said that where such problems exist they should be dealt with by negotiation. If there are serious problems we might have to suspend that military relationship whereby a particular visiting force comes to this country. Of course the bill contains a provision that the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act will apply to any New Zealander who is affected by a relationship with the visiting force. No New Zealanders who may be contract workers or whatever for a visiting force would escape the jurisdiction of our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and our due process. 
One other little problem is not really mentioned in the bill but it can be a big problem for certain people. It has applied I think to the longstanding visiting American force in Christchurch and involves situations whereby New Zealand women become pregnant to members of a visiting force and paternity suits and things like that ensue. Such cases are covered only under civil law and there have been some complaints in terms of pursuing civil cases against former members of the visiting force back into the United States. The bill does not specifically cover that situation but it is something to bear in mind when we deal with this general problem of visiting forces.