Wellington, Apr. 18 : President Barack Obama will be invited to visit New Zealand by the Maori king.

King Tuheitia, who is expected to lead a Tainui delegation to New York next week, would invite Obama to visit New Zealand, the New Zealand Herald reports.

King Tuheitia will join former Prime Minister Helen Clark for her welcome next week as head of the United Nations Development Programme.

King Tuheitia would then ask former United States President Bill Clinton to pass the invitation to Obama to visit his base, Turangawaewae.

Wellington  - In a satirical jibe at stringent censorship imposed by Fiji's military government, the Daily Post newspaper has been filling the space with some no news.

Headlines in Wednesday's edition included "Man gets on bus," over an item reading: "In what is believed to be the first reported incident of its kind, a man got on a bus yesterday. 'It was easy,' he said. 'I just lifted one leg up and then the other and I was on.'"

Wellington - New Zealand's Green Party called Wednesday for the United Nations to stop recruiting soldiers from Fiji, where the military government has imposed emergency rule, as peacekeeping troops in Iraq. "It is deeply ironic that Fiji is involved in rebuilding Iraq," foreign affairs spokesman Keith Locke said. "Fiji's military is more about destroying democracy than restoring it."

Locke said that 223 of the 282 Fijian soldiers and police officers serving with the UN were in Iraq.

Wellington - Fiji's military ruler Voreqe Bainimarama defiantly defended his clampdown on freedom of speech saying Wednesday he wanted no opposition to his plans to abolish the existing electoral system based on race. Bainimarama, who has ruled since ousting the elected government in December 2006, insisted in an interview with Radio New Zealand from the Fiji capital Suva that he would not hold fresh elections before 2014.

Wellington - Fiji strongman Voreqe Bainimarama was back in charge on Saturday, two days after his military government was declared illegal by the Court of Appeal, according to news reports from the capital Suva. Bainimarama, who has governed the country since he ousted the elected government in a bloodless military coup in December 2006, was sworn in by President Ratu Josefa Iloilo as caretaker prime minister for the next five years.

Wellington - Fiji was plunged into political limbo Friday as President Ratu Josefa Iloilo revoked the constitution and sacked the Court of Appeal judges who declared the military government illegal, according to reports from the capital Suva. In an address to the Pacific island nation, Iloilo said he believed that the regime of strongman Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama, who had ruled since seizing power in a bloodless coup in December 2006, had "performed extremely well, brought up new ideas, reforms and improved the lives of the ordinary people," the Fijivillage website reported.