Iwi ponders appeal to UN

Ngapuhi, the country's largest iwi, looks set to drop a bombshell on the Government on the eve of Waitangi commemorations by threatening to take its Treaty claim to an international tribunal, possibly the UN.

It is also understood the tribe plans to refuse any offer of financial compensation for the loss of tens of thousands of hectares that it claims was taken, instead demanding that all land be returned.

Ngapuhi chairman Sonny Tau said details would be released at a hui being held next to Waitangi's Te Tii Marae today.

Waitangi Tribunal chairman Judge Joe Williams is understood to be planning to attend the meeting, a follow-up to a hui held in December at which the tribunal put forward two options for hearing the tribe's claims.

Both offers - a full hearing or an accelerated claims process - were rejected, so Judge Williams called for the tribe to come up with its own proposal.

Mr Tau said the tribunal was funded and influenced by the Crown and therefore could not be seen as impartial.

"We will propose having our claim heard in front of a mutually agreed international body."

He said the United Nations was mooted as a possible forum.

The head of the Kaikohe-based iwi, which has about 107,000 beneficiaries, said iwi members had made it clear that all tribal lands taken must be returned. "Our rangatahi [new generation] have said to us, 'Who are you to sign away our land'. They want our land returned, not money.

"We want our land, confiscated or taken under the Public Works Act, returned, whether it is private land or Government-owned."

A spokesman for Treaty Negotiations Minister Mark Burton said the minister would not discuss the matter while the tribunal was considering it.

The Ngapuhi move would be a further embarrassment for the Government, which last November hosted United Nations representative Rodolfo Stavenhagen, a human rights and race relations expert, who spent 10 days attending four hui, among other meetings, to listen and report on the status of human rights for Maori.

He was invited to New Zealand by the Government after a finding by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in favour of a Maori complaint about the Foreshore and Seabed Act.

Meanwhile, Mr Tau, who is on the organising committee for commemorations, believes there will not be a return to the violent protests that have marred Waitangi Day commemorations in the past.

Last night, it was still uncertain when the country's politicians will be welcomed at Te Tii, the lower marae at Waitangi.

Event organisers were still expecting MPs to be welcomed tomorrow, the day before Waitangi Day, as has been the norm in the past.

But National Party leader Don Brash has indicated he will arrive at the marae about 1.30pm today.

Maori Affairs Minister Parekura Horomia is also expected, and will be accompanied by other Labour MPs.

Prime Minister Helen Clark will avoid Te Tii, sticking to the Treaty Grounds tomorrow night and Monday morning, before attending a festival in Manukau.

Last year, she also skipped visiting the lower marae, where Dr Brash was pelted with mud in 2004.