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Photo: AFP / RAIMON KATAOTAO The date for the Kiribati presidential - or beretitenti - vote has been set for 25 October. Notices were published by electoral districts across the country on Friday. There will now just be three candidates - all from the same party, the ruling Tobwaan Kiribati Party (TKP) - after one TKP candidate, Riteta Iorome, was dropped. There had been no public indication as to why he was not on the ballot. The three still in the race were the man who has been beretitenti for the past eight years, Taneti Maamau, along with Bauntaake Beia and Kaotitaake Kokoria. The TKP used its numbers to block any opposition candidate from standing, prompting Tessie Lambourne - the opposition leader in the last parliament - to say the people were being denied a right to have a bereti...

Guam Legislature generic Photo: RNZ Pacific / Eleisha Foon Why America's muscling up of might in Guam will have a ripple effect in the Pacific, including on NZ's peace-making efforts The tiny island of Guam is known as the tip of the US military spear. It is closer to Beijing than to Hawaii, and is a hugely valuable strategic asset for that reason - especially now there are rising tensions around China's presence in the Pacific, and surrounding North Korean missile testing. Right now there is a massive build-up going on there of the already significant American military presence as it gets ready for a decade of twice-yearly missile weapons testing. By 2028, the US will spend $9 billion to relocate 5000 marines from Japan, build an integrated missile defence system, and add command func...

By Emily Rose and Maya Gebeily Yemenis lift placards and flags of Lebanon's Hezbollah movement during a rally held in the Houthi-controlled capital Sanaa on 27 September, 2024 in protest against Israel's attacks on Lebanon and Gaza. Photo: AFP Israel says it bombed Houthi targets in Yemen on Sunday, expanding its confrontation with Iran's allies in the region after killing the Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah on Friday in an escalating conflict in Lebanon. The airstrikes on Yemen's port of Hodeidah were in response to Houthi missile attacks on Israel in recent days, Israel said, amid fears that Middle East fighting could spin out of control and draw in Iran and Israel's main ally the United States. The Houthi-run Health Ministry said four people had been killed and 29 were w...

Guam Legislature generic Photo: RNZ Pacific / Eleisha Foon Why America's muscling up of might in Guam will have a ripple effect in the Pacific, including on NZ's peace-making efforts The tiny island of Guam is known as the tip of the US military spear. It is closer to Beijing than to Hawaii, and is a hugely valuable strategic asset for that reason - especially now there are rising tensions around China's presence in the Pacific, and surrounding North Korean missile testing. Right now there is a massive build-up going on there of the already significant American military presence as it gets ready for a decade of twice-yearly missile weapons testing. By 2028, the US will spend $9 billion to relocate 5000 marines from Japan, build an integrated missile defence system, and add command func...

By Pavel Polityuk, Reuters This handout photograph taken and released by the National Police of Ukraine on September 28, 2024, shows a damaged hospital building following a drone attack in Sumy. Two Russian strikes on a hospital in the Ukrainian border city of Sumy killed at least six people on 28 September, 2024, the interior minister said. Photo: Handout / National Police of Ukraine / AFP Russia attacked a hospital in Sumy in northeastern Ukraine early on Saturday, killing nine people and injuring at least 19 others, Ukrainian and UN officials said. Danielle Bell, head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, said "loitering munitions" - or suicide drones - hit the Saint Panteleimon Clinical Hospital in two attacks 45 minutes apart. "Most of the fatalities occurred dur...

Keir Starmer led the Labour Party to a sweeping victory in the July election. Photo: CLAUDIA GRECO / AFP British lawmaker Rosie Duffield quit the ruling Labour Party on Saturday in protest at Prime Minister Keir Starmer's approach to child poverty and his acceptance of tens of thousands of pounds of free clothing and hospitality from political donors. In her resignation letter, a copy of which she gave to The Sunday Times newspaper, Duffield accused Starmer of "sleaze, nepotism and apparent avarice", adding: "I am so ashamed of what you and your inner circle have done to tarnish and humiliate our once proud party." Starmer, who was Britain's top prosecutor before entering parliament, said on 20 September he would stop accepting donations to pay for clothing for him and his wife. Duffiel...

A year ago, the last government torched its plan for a joined-up public broadcaster more like Australia's one. But the ABC is a billion-dollar beast that's also been a political football. Mediawatch asks its outgoing boss where it - and David Anderson himself - is heading. The ABC's boss David Anderson answers questions on ABC TV last month about his decision to step down at the end of the year. Photo: screenshot / ABC TV news "To speak truth to power, news media have . . . to be big enough and strong enough that politicians and other holders of power can't afford to ignore them. Without that, we're in trouble," warned Gavin Ellis, former editor of the New Zealand Herald. In a recent talk entitled 'The Day the News Dies', Ellis went on to say commercial news media companies here we...