Source: Al Jazeera [Qatari state media]
“New Zealand legislators have voted to suspend three MPs who performed a Maori haka in the House to protest against a controversial bill. The MPs from Te Pati Maori – the Maori Party – were handed the toughest sanctions ever imposed on legislators by New Zealand’s parliament on Thursday. … The legislators had performed the haka in parliament in November. Their protest interrupted voting during the first reading of a proposed bill to legally define the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, the 1840 pact between the British Crown and Indigenous Maori leaders signed during New Zealand’s colonisation. The proposed law prompted widespread protests amid concerns it would erode Maori rights. It was later scrapped.” (06/05/24)