Ardern has made NZ a global laughing stock over Russia

NewstalkZb reports:

New Zealand is being called an international laughing stock for claiming there are no Russian spies here to expel.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said that the NZ Security Intelligence Service has told her there are no Russian “undeclared intelligence officers” in New Zealand, but if there were, she would kick them out.

New Zealand has garnered international headlines for not following other countries that are expelling Russian diplomats in protest over the use of a Russian nerve agent to poison former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia Skripal.

Twenty six countries have reportedly expelled Russian envoys in the past few days, among them New Zealand’s Five Eyes security partners Australia, Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom.

I’m in Australia at the moment and the newspaper here had a column on how ridiculous Ardern’s claims were.  They’ve made multiple international newspapers.

But security analyst Paul Buchanan said Ardern’s claim that there were no Russian spies in New Zealand was laughable.

“Unbelievably silly thing to say, and it has made New Zealand a laughing stock,” he told Radio NZ this morning.

The hold that Russia has over Peters, and through him Ardern, seems to be monumental. Even Trump has acted strongly on this. But NZ has done nothing more than a couple of press releases.