23 March 2021

IWCNZ appreciates the release of the Arotake Report. While it’s a positive move towards transparency, it reinforces that there are many outstanding questions that need to be answered about the systems and processes within the New Zealand Security Intelligence Services (NZSIS).

This was an internal investigation, in that the terms of reference were set by the Director of the NZSIS, and the review was carried out by a member of a Five Eyes partner. Given that New Zealand has defense and security relationships with Five Eyes partners, this is not a fully independent review. Any failure of the NZSIS would also reflect badly on the partners who were providing intelligence and tools to New Zealand.

The Director of the NZSIS is appearing before the Intelligence and Security Select Committee tomorrow. IWCNZ is providing some of the questions that she needs to address:

• How was the business decision made to prioritise Islamist extremist terrorism, and what informed that decision? How is a prioritisation decision translated from high-level to mid-level to lower levels?
• Since issuance of this report, what have the SIS done to adapt their system? What are they doing to ensure, until a new system is built, that there will not be anything lost in translation from high level to mid-level to lower levels?
• There are white supremacists and also misogynist threats. How can we be sure that these threats are being addressed?
• This Arotake report was not an internal investigation, it was a learning or sharing project as no-one was required to participate. Anyone who had controversial information could have withheld it. The reviewer conducted a database search but the report states that they can’t guarantee they got everything. Intelligence officers are officers of this nation, why did they get to choose to participate in this investigation?
• The report revealed that an extensive array of unique identifiers attributable to the Christchurch terrorist were discovered post the attacks. They were already in existence prior to the terrorist attack, so what impeded their discovery before the attack happened?
• They knew of the terrorist’s travel in and out of NZ, but found it unremarkable. He went to North Korea, Myanmar, Serbia, Bosnia, Pakistan, and Peru, amongst other countries. He spent quite a bit of time in these places, and it’s difficult to understand why this travel was unremarkable. Why wouldn’t this range of countries trigger questioning upon arrival?

Having only received the report midday Monday, it needs further analysis by experts and there will be further questions. We look forward to a full response at the Intelligence and Security Select Committee and we will be listening with keen interest to her testimony.

© Scoop Media