Prime Minister Christopher Luxon says his team has not focused on securing a meeting with US President Joe Biden during his trip to the United States.
Luxon has arrived in Washington DC to attend a NATO summit, the city in high-security mode with motorcades transporting global leaders including Emmanuel Macron, Justin Trudeau, Volodymyr Zelensky and Fumio Kishida.
Luxon has not yet managed to secure a formal bilateral meeting with Biden. He said he had not been focused on it anyway.
"No, no that has not been our focus. We are here genuinely as guests of NATO and President Biden is hosting the whole of Nato here - obviously 32 countries plus the six others that are here as well - so that has not been a goal or objective of ours.
"I just put to you that we are actually here as guests of Nato, President Biden is hosting Nato here in DC and we have been invited as one of the IP4 along with Japan, Korea, Australia and ourselves to be here as well."
The US Presidential election had also not been a focus of his conversations, he said.
"Our focus has been around making sure we talk about issues that are common interest between the US and New Zealand, a lot of it about the rules-based system and making sure that our alignment on our values, and the joint programmes of work that we have."
Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone
He said whether Biden would continue as a candidate in the US election was a matter for the American people.
"My job as prime minister is to make sure that I can work with whoever the people of America select as their president.
"But this is not a bilateral visit here, this is about us using the opportunity to build a bilateral relationship and deepen that across a number of different leaders across the US system, doing the same obviously seeing a number of European leaders in one place."
He said he would confirm official meetings with leaders tomorrow.
Ukraine, Russia, and India
In the meantime, Luxon spent several hours meeting with Senators and Congress members on Wednesday morning (local time), discussing what he said were "consistent themes".
"Issues within the Indo-Pacific region, global themes particularly with NATO in mind - the reason we're here this week - and it was a good chance for us to talk about the Ukraine.
"I've really enjoyed the stimulation of getting in the room with senators and congresspeople who are actually really deeply thinking about these issues."
He has announced a further $16 million in support for Ukraine, bringing New Zealand's total contribution to more than $130m.
Given New Zealand's distance from Ukraine and the stance alongside that country from day one of Russia's invasion, showed New Zealand had made a "really valuable contribution that is appreciated by Ukraine," Luxon said, and the government would continue to monitor and assess whether more support was needed.
Russian President Vladimir Putin's meeting with India's recently re-elected Prime Minister Narendra Modi stands as something of a counterpoint to Biden's NATO meeting.
Modi said every Indian "considers Russia to be India's friend in good and bad times".
During the election campaign last year, Luxon promised to secure a free trade deal with India and work towards a deeper relationship with the country.
"India has its own national interests that it obviously advances, I'm here to advance New Zealand's national interests," he said when questioned about the Putin-Modi meeting.
"For us it is about making sure that we actually can deepen and build a relationship with India, it doesn't mean that we agree with every country we have trading relationships with .... and it's the same here.
"India's had a long-standing to Russia, clearly I think, you know, when you've seen President Putin in that illegal war in Ukraine, and we've seen damage done to a hospital today with Ukrainian school children in it, it's not great."
Darleen Tana
Prompted by journalists, Luxon refused to get involved in the Darleen Tana situation.
"Those are issues for the Green Party, every party handles its personnel issues differently and it's been certainly a long time coming for whatever, um, but, I appreciate that's an issue for the Greens," he said.
Tana was elected to Parliament on the Green Party list but has faced accusations relating to her husband's e-bike company of worker exploitation, including of migrants.
The Greens commissioned an independent investigation in March after those accusations came to light, and voted to eject Tana after the final report was delivered this weekend.
However, Tana chose to quit the party first and is now able to remain an independent MP with a full salary and voting rights until the next election unless the party chooses to use the party-hopping law it has opposed as a matter of principle.
Luxon - questioned on whether Tana should be able to remain - said it was still a matter for the Greens and the Speaker to sort out.
"It's not someone in my party, right? And I've managed my personnel issues as you've seen, over the last three years and I'll continue to do so. I just have been amazed at how long it has taken to get to this resolution, and so those are obviously issues for the Green Party, they're obviously issues for the Speaker and Parliament."