New Zealand labels Proud Boys and the Base terrorist organisations

New Zealand has labelled the Proud Boys and the Base as terrorist organisations in its fight against right-wing extremism.

The designation was approved by a top police official on 20 June but wasn't made public until recently. The prime minister's office said New Zealand actively reviews and updates its terrorist blacklist. The organisations join the Islamic State and al-Shabab on the list.

Canada has already labelled both organisations as terrorist groups, and the UK has labelled the Base an extremist organisation.

The declaration means it is now illegal for New Zealand residents to fund or support either group.

It is not clear how big a presence each group has in New Zealand, but Former New Zealand attorney general, Christopher Finlayson said that many groups on the list were not active in the country.

In explaining the decision to add the Base to the list, police officials noted their intention to start a race war and create a white ethno-state and mentioned the arrests of members in the US who are accused of planning to kill a couple with anti-facist views.

Supporting the decision to add the Proud Boys to the list, officials cited their participation in the 6 January 2021 insurrection in Washington.

There has been recent political violence in New Zealand, though it is rare. Anti-covid-restriction protesters set fire to tents and threw chairs, bottles and bricks at police officers in March, whilst they tried to clear a protest camp near parliament.

John Ip, a law professor and counterterrorism expert at the University of Auckland, said there had been concern that the government did not label far-right groups as terrorist entities despite a 2019 mass shooting by a white supremacist at two mosques in Christchurch that killed 51 people, noting that the UK and Canada had done this earlier.