Printing cartoons put Kiwis overseas at risk, says Clark

Helen Clark

New Zealand newspapers had the absolute right to publish but the decision to print cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed was "ill-judged" and put the lives of New Zealanders overseas at risk, Prime Minister Helen Clark said today.

Embassies have been torched and new protests have erupted across Asia and the Middle East over the cartoons.

Denmark has been the main target of Muslim rage as the images, one showing the Prophet Mohammad with a turban resembling a bomb, first appeared in a Danish daily.

Muslims in the Gulf region are boycotting Danish goods but Iran has now said it is reviewing trade ties with all countries that published the cartoons, including New Zealand after the Dominion Post, the Press and the Nelson Mail published the caricatures.

Miss Clark told Newstalk ZB today that publishing the cartoons conveyed disrespect for Muslim people at a time when it was inflaming relations.

New Zealand was now faced with the situation where some media had "dragged us into this and it puts our people offshore at risk," she said.

In another interview on TV One she said she had advice "that if the cartoons were published in New Zealand there would certainly be security implications for our people offshore. The Dominion (Post) published knowing that."

The media made decisions all the time about what it would and would not publish.

"I think a decision to publish is always one of judgement, or one of taste, or one of timing and even I know that media exercise that judgement and that taste all the time.

"We don't always agree with the decisions they make. We always defend the right to publish. That is absolute in a country like ours but the question is, is a particular decision at a particular time the right one. It's fair to say that most newspapers in our country haven't published the cartoons."

The decision by some newspapers to publish might have been considered "a little further than it was".

In the end, the decision to publish the cartoons was "simply gratuitous".

"It's not done for any good reason at all," she said.

"Judgement about taste, timing, content, this is the stock and trade of an editorial room and sometimes, in my view, they don't get it right."

Most Kiwis were wondering why New Zealand had got into this row, Miss Clark said.

She was questioned over whether the violent reaction in the Muslim world to the publication of the cartoons simply showed how intolerant the Muslim world was to anything questioning Islamic beliefs.

Islam, like Christianity, contained the whole spectrum of opinion, she said.

"Just as we wouldn't condemn everyone who adhered to the Christian faith because some people felt so strongly about abortion that they murdered a doctor who performed it, nor should we condemn all of Islam because out on the edge some people commit very extreme crimes.

"I think we're all watching very, very shocked as the embassies of peaceful countries like Norway and Denmark are ransacked. It's an appalling thing to happen."

Trade Minister Phil Goff said today that the publication of the cartoons in New Zealand had the potential to damage New Zealand trade to Iran and other "offended" countries and officials were working to counter that.

Mr Goff said no country had specifically said it would boycott New Zealand goods and "we hope that it won't happen".

However, the Iranian government had set up a committee to look at and possibly annul trade deals with countries that had published the cartoons.

"So we can't rule out that there may be a damaging effect from their printing in New Zealand."

New Zealand exports to Iran were worth more than $100 million a year while its exports to the wider Islamic world totalled around $1.5 billion.

The Government had made clear that neither exporters nor the Government were responsible for the editorial decisions of newspapers.

This message was being conveyed by foreign affairs officials to the Iranian ambassador in New Zealand and to officials in Iran.

Given the reaction in Denmark, Norway and Sweden, that might not work.

"But I think at this stage all we can do is make clear the facts of the situation and hope that the outcome is not damaging to New Zealand exporters and that the matter will be seen as it is -- a judgment made by some newspaper editors while other newspaper editors made the opposition judgment."

Mr Goff said he was concerned about the intensity of the response to the publication of the cartoons.

New Zealand staff at embassies and trade offices around the world were conscious of that "level of emotion" but he was not aware of any formal security directives to staff, "we certainly aren't closing embassies or anything of that nature".

A Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman said it had received no reports of staff at New Zealand embassies and offices overseas having any problems.

There had been coverage in Turkey, Iran and Eygpt of the fact newspapers in New Zealand had published the cartoons, although it was also noted this was a decision independent of the Government's support, Mr Goff said.

- NZPA