On Monday 5 February at 1pm join us for a special screening of Operation 8: Deep in the Forest (2011), a film by Abi King-Jones and Errol Wright. Afterwards join us with Te Waka Hourua for a wānanga using the film as a starting point for conversation.

On October 15, 2007, activists around New Zealand woke to guns in their faces. Black-clad police smashed down doors, dragging families out onto roads. In the rural village of Rūātoki, helicopters hovered while locals were stopped at roadblocks. Operation 8 involved 18 months of invasive surveillance of Māori sovereignty and peace activists accused of attending armed training camps in the Urewera ranges – homeland of the Tūhoe people. Operation 8: Deep in the Forest asks how and why the raids took place. How did the War on Terror become a global witch-hunt of political dissenters reaching even to the South Pacific?

Screening time: 112 minutes.