Contents of the United States diplomatic cables leak (New Zealand)

Content from the United States diplomatic cables leak has depicted New Zealand and related subjects extensively. The leak, which began on 28 November 2010, occurred when the website of WikiLeaks – an international new media non-profit organisation that publishes submissions of otherwise unavailable documents from anonymous news sources and news leaks – started to publish classified documents of detailed correspondence – diplomatic cables – between the United States Department of State and its diplomatic missions around the world. Since the initial release date, WikiLeaks is releasing further documents every day.

Nuclear policy

New Zealand's anti-nuclear policy of the 1980s was partly motivated by economic considerations. A 2004 diplomatic cable reports, "officials who were in senior positions in the Lange government at the time the anti-nuclear policy was instituted that one of the considerations favouring the policy was that it would lead to New Zealand withdrawing or being pushed out of Anzus, thereby lessening the country's defence-spending requirements at a time of fiscal and economic crisis".

In 2005, then-U.S. Ambassador to New Zealand Charles Swindells, sought to have New Zealand reverse its anti-nuclear stance, which was formalised in 1987 by New Zealand's legal prohibition on the entry into New Zealand waters of nuclear-armed or -propelled ships, and urged his colleagues in the U.S. to investigate strategies for changing the policy, including proposing a feasibility study for a free-trade agreement between New Zealand and the U.S.

According to the cables, full collaboration between the intelligence agencies of the U.S. and New Zealand – curtailed by the U.S. in the 1980s because of New Zealand's anti-nuclear policies – were resumed in August 2009, something both governments kept secret.

The U.S. Ambassador had concerns that the anti-nuclear legislation had eroded trust in New Zealand, thereby threatening intelligence cooperation. He was reacting to a New Zealand newspaper article which stressed the Ambassador's concern that if New Zealand were expelled from the "five-eyes" arrangement, the door would be opened for the United States to conduct intelligence gathering operations against the Kiwis. The Sunday Star-Times labelled the then Ambassador's language "a clear threat" and "bully tactics."

2006 Fijian coup d'état

The diplomatic cables leak reveal that the New Zealand government was spying on the military of nearby Fiji leading up to the 2006 Fijian coup d'état. Information obtained was passed on to the U.S. The cable did not contain the information that was gathered.