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RNZ News
an hour ago
- RNZ News
Car fire in building on the Terrace treated as suspicious
File photo. Photo: Pretoria Gordon / RNZ A car fire involving a vehicle that was parked in a building on the Terrace in central Wellington is being treated as suspicious. Fire and Emergency got the call to the scene about 6pm with four fire crews, including an aerial fire truck, attending. The fire was now extinguished, with one crew still at the scene. A fire investigator has been called in and police have been notified.

1News
2 hours ago
- 1News
Trump announces trade deal with Japan, lowers threatened tariff to 15%
President Donald Trump announced a trade framework with Japan on Tuesday, placing a 15% tax on goods imported from that nation. 'This Deal will create Hundreds of Thousands of Jobs — There has never been anything like it,' Trump posted on Truth Social, adding that the United States "will continue to always have a great relationship with the Country of Japan". The president said Japan would invest "at my direction" US$550 billion (NZ$914 billion) into the US and would "open" its economy to American autos and rice. The 15% tax on imported Japanese goods is a meaningful drop from the 25% rate that Trump, in a recent letter to Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, said would be levied starting August 1. Early Wednesday, Ishiba acknowledged the new trade agreement, saying it would benefit both sides and help them work together. With the announcement, Trump is seeking to tout his ability as a dealmaker — even as his tariffs, when initially announced in early April, led to a market panic and fears of slower growth that for the moment appear to have subsided. Key details remained unclear from his post, such as whether Japanese-built autos would face a higher 25% tariff that Trump imposed on the sector. ADVERTISEMENT But the framework fits a growing pattern for Trump, who is eager to portray the tariffs as win for the US. His administration says the revenues will help reduce the budget deficit and more factories will relocate to America to avoid the import taxes and cause trade imbalances to disappear. The wave of tariffs continues to be a source of uncertainty about whether it could lead to higher prices for consumers and businesses if companies simply pass along the costs. The problem was seen sharply Wednesday after General Motors reported a 35% drop in its net income during the second quarter as it warned that tariffs would hit its business in the months ahead, causing its stock to tumble. A staff member distributes an extra edition of the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper reporting that President Donald Trump announced a trade framework with Japan (Source: Associated Press) As the August 1 deadline for the tariff rates in his letters to world leaders is approaching, Trump also announced a trade framework with the Philippines that would impose a tariff of 19% on its goods, while American-made products would face no import taxes. The president also reaffirmed his 19% tariffs on Indonesia. The US ran a US$69.4 billion (NZ$115 billion) trade imbalance on goods with Japan last year, according to the Census Bureau. America had a trade imbalance of US$17.9 billion (NZ$29 billion) with Indonesia and an imbalance of US$4.9 billion (NZ$8.1 billion) with the Philippines. Both nations are less affluent than the US and an imbalance means America imports more from those countries than it exports to them. The president is set to impose the broad tariffs listed in his recent letters to other world leaders on August 1, raising questions of whether there will be any breakthrough in talks with the European Union. At a Wednesday dinner, Trump said the EU would be in Washington on Thursday for trade talks. ADVERTISEMENT "We have Europe coming in tomorrow, the next day," Trump told guests. The President, earlier this month, sent a letter threatening the 27 member states in the EU with 30% taxes on their goods to be imposed starting on August 1. The Trump administration has a separate negotiating period with China that is currently set to run through August 12 as goods from that nation are taxed at an additional 30% baseline. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he would be in the Swedish capital of Stockholm next Monday and Tuesday to meet with his Chinese counterparts. Bessent said his goal is to shift the American economy away from consumption and to enable more consumer spending in the manufacturing-heavy Chinese economy. "President Trump is remaking the US into a manufacturing economy," Bessent said on the Fox Business Network show Mornings with Maria. "If we could do that together, we do more manufacturing, they do more consumption. That would be a home run for the global economy."

RNZ News
3 hours ago
- RNZ News
The House: Foreign Minister Winston Peters navigates opposition questions on Gaza
Winston Peters speaking in the debate on a ministerial statement regarding the Israel/USA/Iran conflict. Photo: VNP / Phil Smith For Foreign Minister Winston Peters, the sitting week began with the task of navigating opposition questions on the war in Gaza. The questions were asked of Peters, not during question time, but following his Ministerial Statement on the government response to the situation in the Middle East - his second statement on this in as many months. The statement itself echoed the joint statement made on 21 July by New Zealand (and 27 other countries, including Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom), calling for an end to the war in Gaza. "The international community is united in its revulsion to what is happening in Gaza," Peters told the House. "This horror must end. Too many lives have been lost; too many people have been traumatised, polarised, and embittered, ensuring that yet another generation of Israeli and Palestinian children are born into a situation of insufferable conflict and enmity. That is why New Zealand has come together with Foreign Ministers from 27 other countries to state as clearly as we can that enough is enough, that this war must end now, that this suffering is intolerable." "In that joint statement, we condemned Hamas' continued detention of hostages and called for their immediate and unconditional release, and we condemned Israel's policies, which are leading to untold and unimaginable suffering and death among Palestinian civilians. And we call for [Israel] to comply with its obligations under international humanitarian law." Ministerial statements are used by governments to brief Parliament-and by extension the public-on an unfolding situation or event, and to explain the government's plan of action in response to it. They resemble an MP-only press conference, wherein a minister delivers a statement, followed by questions or comments from MPs from other parties, generally spokespersons on the relevant topic. Like a press conference, the most interesting or illuminating information comes not from a minister's prepared statement, but from the Q&A that follows. In Tuesday's exchange, all three opposition parties held similar stances - supporting the joint statement, while also questioning what they perceived to be a reluctance from the government to follow up those words with actions. The Greens' Teanau Tuiono asked about potential concrete measures like sanctions the government could take to support its condemnation of Israel's actions in Gaza. "The discussions [with the signatories] have been wide ranging," Peters said. "We do not want to make a decision or actions which are purely symbolic in nature and of no real meaning in fact." Tuiono followed up by asking why the government had not also frozen the assets of the two Israeli Ministers who had received a ban from travelling to New Zealand. "Because we do not believe that the justification for that, at this point in time, has been established," Peters replied. Calls from the Greens and Te Pāti Māori to recognise Palestinian statehood were met with a familiar response from Peters. "We have always said, this government, that it's not a matter of 'if' but 'when'. The question that has to be answered-saving us lowering our standards of statehood-who would we negotiate with? Who would we talk to…. We have talked to Egypt about that. We've talked to many Middle Eastern countries about that. We've talked to [the United Arab] Emirates about that. We've talked to Indonesia about that. We're all on the same wavelength here. Who would we talk to, to establish this so-called state? Or are we just virtue signalling? Virtue signalling is not what we're going to do here." Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi's version of the question was relatively more blunt than Tuiono's. "Does the Minister, and this government, recognise Palestine as a sovereign state - yes or no?" Peter's answer evoked a sense of deja vu. "We have made it clear that, for us, it's a question of not if but when. But we need to ensure we do not lower the standards of what statehood comprises. There, in our conversation with the Middle East and with Egypt and other countries bordering there, knowing far more about the circumstances than us, they have an agreement with us. We need to establish who it is we're going to negotiate with before we recognise [it]." President of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) US lawyer Joan Donoghue (2R) confers with colleagues at the court in The Hague on 12 January, 2024, prior to the hearing of the genocide case against Israel, brought by South Africa. Photo: Remko de Waal / ANP / AFP Labour's Peeni Henare asked Peters whether allegations of a genocide in Gaza was something the International Court of Justice should determine, and not politicians. "Yes, we agree in the sense that the court of which that member speaks has got a duty, but hitherto they have not found that, they have taken it by way of investigation and reviewed it. But they have not come down with a precedent, directive, or, dare I say, finding. However, that still doesn't obligate the rest of us needing to be considering the merit or otherwise of such a claim and to see whether it is substantial or not," Peters replied. After being pressed on the issue again by Waititi, Peters gave a similar answer. "It has not been declared by the international courts to be that, so we are not going to add our support to something that is not based on facts but is based on what someone would hope to be the case regardless of legal precedent." In the joint statement, there is a condemnation of what is referred to as a "drip feeding" of humanitarian aid to Gazans. Signatories to the statement, including Peters, hope that momentum from this collective condemnation will put pressure on those responsible for distributing aid to those in need. Henare had a series of questions for the minister on New Zealand's role in the area of humanitarian aid. Henare: "Is the government concerned by the widespread criticism of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, including by over 240 NGOs, and has New Zealand contributed funding to the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation; and if so, what conditions, if any, were attached?" Peters: "The reality is that we have a duty in these circumstances, no matter how desperate they are and inhumanitarian they are, to ensure we can recount to the New Zealand taxpayer. And that's why, when we ran into difficulties with the server of aid, and they were under suspicion, and indeed under investigation, by the United Nations themselves, we found other organisations with credibility to assist us, to ensure that the aid continued. That has always been our course, under successive governments." Henare: "Will the government commit to more aid resource to fill the need in this unfolding humanitarian crisis?" Peters: "I understand what the member has asked for, but the reality is New Zealand has already given significant amounts of aid, and at a time when the international economy is facing uncertainty and so is the domestic economy as a consequence. We also have serious aid programmes in the Pacific, which are our number one priorities and have been under the last two governments. And so whilst we'll carry on endeavouring to help out, remember this: it is an awful long way away from New Zealand, and we have the right to feel awfully frustrated that for decades of all of our lives, this issue has been there, at the centre of international news. We hope one day it would finally be over." *RNZ's The House, with insights into Parliament, legislation and issues, is made with funding from Parliament's Office of the Clerk.