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Speaker 1: Still got trouble the Cooks. Quickly we're pushing more ride

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Speaker 1: or pausing more ride. Talks broke down again. This is

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Speaker 1: all I have a China. Of course, we paused eighteen

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Speaker 1: million back in June. Now another parliament's been suspended, so

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Speaker 1: we're up to thirty million. That's not going their way.

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Speaker 1: Steve Hoodley, international relations expert with a Steve Morning.

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Speaker 2: Good morning mate.

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Speaker 1: How much of this is Mark Brown versus just the

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Speaker 1: Cooks generally?

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Speaker 2: Well, you wonder is it personality because Winston Peters has

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Speaker 2: a long history of agitation with the Cook Islands, going

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Speaker 2: way back to the wine box scandal now when you

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Speaker 2: and I were just youths, and it's still going on

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Speaker 2: through it the present day. But I think there's a

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Speaker 2: serious diplomatic issue here. Cook Islands has broken the protocol,

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Speaker 2: has violated the twenty twenty one agreement, has embarrassed New

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Speaker 2: Zealand by going and sunning these agreements with China and

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Speaker 2: not informing us. So I think Cook Islands are in

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Speaker 2: the wrong here.

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Speaker 1: And nobody disagrees with that. I don't think do they.

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Speaker 1: So basically is we wait for them to acquiesce or not,

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Speaker 1: and that's where it sits is.

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Speaker 2: They're not going to acquays, They're going to turn to China.

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Speaker 2: They're going to float a thirty million dollar loan from

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Speaker 2: China's Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and go further into debt

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Speaker 2: to China and slip. Cook Islands is going to slip

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Speaker 2: away from New Zealand's influence And.

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Speaker 1: Is that isolated to the Cooks or does that then

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Speaker 1: become a problem in the Pacific generally?

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Speaker 2: Well? Is the same thing is happening in Solomon Island's

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Speaker 2: Visa VI Australia, same things happening in Palau the United States.

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Speaker 2: Neither of those two countries have suspended AID. New Zealand

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Speaker 2: is the only one to suspend AID, which I think

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Speaker 2: just opens the door for China to walk in further

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Speaker 2: and have more influence. So I'm not sure this is

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Speaker 2: a great idea.

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Speaker 1: All right, might must catch up for shut Sleep Hardley

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Speaker 1: International Relationships. But for more from the Mic Hosking Breakfast,

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