Knighted for services to torture

Mateparae becomes a Sir
Incoming Governor-General and former defence force boss Lieutenant General Jerry Mateparae has now become a Sir.

When there is such dissent building over the appointment of Jerry Mateparae, John Key knights Jerry for his services towards torturing civilians in Afghanistan.

It is questionable whether a former military man and the current spy boss should be appointed to the Governor-General in the first place, now there are the allegations that he helped find legal loopholes to hand over civilians to known torture units there must be an independent investigation, and knighting Gerry looks like an attempt at whitewashing his reputation in the light of those allegations.

This isn't pinkos who are now asking angry questions about our role in enabling torture, these calls are coming from shocked leafy 'Listener Subscribing' suburbs, and the leafy 'Listener Subscribing' suburbs are not happy thinking their brave boys are actually handing people over for torture.

As Keith Locke points out, that number of torture empowerment's has now jumped to 35...

NZSAS Present 35 Times When Prisoners Taken
SAS present 35 times when prisoners taken, but minister dodges any responsibility for their welfare.

Denials that our SAS troops could be handing Afghan prisoners over to torture are getting less and less credible.

The government claims that on joint operations with the Afghan Crisis Response Unit our boys don’t take any prisoners. Last year, when I asked the NZ Defence Force about this – during a Select Committee hearings – I was told the SAS had been “in the vicinity” on 22 joint operations when prisoners were taken. On May 3 Defence Minister Wayne Mapp told me in the House that there were now 24 occasions where our SAS had been “in support” when prisoners were taken. Four days later, in response to my Written Question (03022), he upped that figure to 35.

...so that's 35 separate times we have empowered torture to prop up a corrupt regime?

The Government keeps denying we need an independent inquiry to find out if we are actually handing civilians over to known torture units and if so, whether we have breached international law and if war crimes have been committed by NZ troops. Such allegations demand answers, and not just to those the Government write off as 'lefty liberals', increasingly many sections of NZ are angrily demanding to know just what the hell our SAS are doing in this immoral war.

Knighting Mateparae for his services towards torture are not a good look.

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