Apia, Samoa: Samoa's Head of State has used the word “evil” in connection with New Zealand’s political sanctions against Fiji’s administration, reports Stuff NZ. 

Tuiatua Tupua Tamasese has issued a statement on his talks last week with New Zealand Prime Minister John Key in Samoa.

Mr Key yesterday said his conversation with Tuiatua had not been hostile over New Zealand and Australia’s sanctions, which followed Commodore Frank Bainimarama’s 2006 military coup.

But Tuiatua's office said that some of the issues he raised with Mr Key included questioning the morality of the current sanctions “bearing in mind that the poor and the innocent will bear the brunt of the consequential hardship.”

“How will this hardship assist to create and nurture an environment which will counter a coup mentality and culture?” Tuiatua said.

“Will the question which grapples the conscience of the world in the aftermath of Iraq bedevil the conscience of the region in the aftermath of what is happening in Fiji? The question is: How much evil do you need to do in order to do good?”

According to the Sunday Samoa Observer, which received the statement, Tuiatua would make no further comment.

Mr Key meanwhile said his talks with Tuiatua had been extensive and “very constructive”.

Tuiatua’s concerns for Fiji contrast to those of the country’s Prime Minister, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, who has strongly attacked Commodore Bainimarama on personal grounds.

Head of State Tuiatua’s comments to Mr Key reflect a longstanding political division in Samoa.

Tuiatua, when known as Tupuola Efi, was Prime Minister between 1976 and 1982, losing recent elections to the current Prime Minister’s ruling party.