New Zealand is still waiting to find out what was happening in the Tuhoe community before police raids a fortnight ago - and why police cited the Terrorism Suppression Act (TSA).
Some civil groups are upset by the arrests and the citing of the TSA, and protests around the country have been swelling. NZ First leader Winston Peters has labelled protestors "separatists".
"They are not marching because he is guilty or innocent, they are marching because he is brown," he said at the NZ First national conference in Taupo.
Prime Minister Helen Clark said yesterday that Maori had not been specifically targeted by police in the raids, rebutting a claim from the Maori Party.
"The police targeted what they believed were offences and their decisions and the Solicitor-General's decisions about that will be known in the fullness of time and I think probably not too far away," Miss Clark said on Newstalk ZB. "So I think we are all better to suspend judgment about this until we see what evidence the police intend to put forward before a court."
"If people are running around with guns, practicing the use of molotov cocktails, napalm, and so on – that's not the New Zealand we know, that's not the New Zealand I would have thought any reasonable person wanted."
Police commissioner Howard Broad said in a release put out on October 15, that police were acting on information that a number of people had been involved in weapons training camps.
New Zealand Terrorism Suppression Act defines the term 'terrorist act' as:
a. Is intended to cause the death of, or serious bodily injury to, one or more persons; and
b. Is carried out for the purpose of advancing an ideological, political, or religious cause; and
c. Is intended to either: i. Induce terror in a civilian population; or ii. Unduly compel or to force a government or an international organisation to do or abstain from doing any act; and
d. Is not an act that occurs in a situation of armed conflict and which is, at the time and in the place that it occurs, in accordance with rules of international law applicable to the conflict.
A Maori sovereignty website run by one of the arrested men was reportedly shut down the same day. An informant said the website had links to other indigenous groups around the world.
Rongomai Bailey, one of the 17 arrested, spoke at a protest rally outside Mount Eden Prison in Auckland where those on remand are being held.
"I am not the enemy. I am going to say 'enough of this crap'. We are standing up for our communities," he said.
A father of one of the men arrested also spoke at the rally. His son has name suppression.
He said he now has two sons in jail.
"Me and my grandchildren and a lot of people in Tuhoe are scared. We're dead scared. Just lights coming down the drive, we think it's the police coming," he said.
International lawyer Greg Thwaite said attacks like 9/11, the bombings in the London underground, and the train bombings in Madrid had made Western society more fearful.
"There is a rising level of violence," he said.
Auckland barrister Tim McBride agreed that it was only after 9/11 that the public would allow the act to pass through Parliament.
He said the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill 1977 had provoked massive public outcry, but the TSA passed in 2002 with very little fuss.
Nicky Hager, author of The Hollow Men also spoke at the forum.
"I don't have a clear idea of what the police are alleging or what is going on. It is still surrounded in secrecy."
Mr Hager was particularly concerned that the police had confiscated people's computers and cellphones during the operation.
Peace Movement Aoteoroa coordinator Edwina Hughes said the police were questioning anyone that had been in contact with the 17 arrested.
Ms Hughes was speaking at the opening of the National Peace and Conflict Studies Centre in Auckland on Saturday.
She said TSA should never have been mentioned because the offences could be dealt with under criminal law.
"The thing that concerns all the people that have been arrested is their involvement in Tuhoe Tanga and Tino Tangatiratanga," she said.
The Solicitor-General will now decide if charges under the Terrorist Suppression Act will be laid.
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