New Zealand's maverick new foreign minister yesterday said Asian leaders understand his calls for tough controls on immigration and advocate similar measures.
In an interview, Winston Peters dismissed critics who say his anti-Asian immigration stance makes it impossible for him to represent New Zealand in Asian capitals.
"The people who say that are absurdly uninformed on immigration policy as it applies in Asian nations," Peters said.
His repeated calls for tough controls on immigration levels was "the very same policy that every Asian political party leader ... all the way to Turkey ... have themselves advocated," he said.
During a 2002 election campaign, Peters said that New Zealand was at risk because of an influx "of people whose views are formed by alien cultures and rigid religious practices. If immigrants are allowed to settle here, regardless of their ability or willingness to live in harmony with us, we will create a breeding ground for conflict."
The chairman of the New Zealand Malaysia Business Council, John Wong, said on Tuesday that Peters' appointment was an insult to New Zealand.
"His anti-immigrant image is definitely not good for the country," he said.
But Asian leaders have never raised the issue with him during visits and meetings, said Peters, the leader of the nationalist New Zealand First party, shortly before being sworn in as foreign minister in Prime Minister Helen Clark's third successive Labour-led administration.
"The leadership in China, for example, find it absolutely a matter of bemusement that journalists are somehow asserting this [immigration] policy is somehow anti-Asian. They have never raised it with me, quite the contrary," he said.
"People like [former Chinese premier] Zhu Rongji (
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