{"id":23287,"date":"2025-06-19T14:01:01","date_gmt":"2025-06-19T08:31:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=23287"},"modified":"2025-06-19T16:44:54","modified_gmt":"2025-06-19T11:14:54","slug":"cook-islands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/cook-islands\/","title":{"rendered":"Cook Islands"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Cook Islands Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">New Zealand recently suspended millions of dollars in budget funding to the Cook Islands, as the relationship between the two constitutionally linked countries continues to deteriorate amid the island group&#8217;s deepening ties with China.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>About Cook Islands<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Cook Islands are a group of <\/span><b>15 small islands<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that are spread over <\/span><b>2 million sq. km<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in the <\/span><b>South Pacific Ocean.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These islands are geographically positioned <\/span><b>both in the Southern and Eastern hemisphere<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s of the Earth.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The islands are situated in the <\/span><b>center of the Polynesian Triangle<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2013about <\/span><b>halfway between Hawaii and New Zealand.\u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Cook Islands are located to the <\/span><b>east of Niue, Tonga,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><b>Samoa<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">; to the <\/span><b>northeast of New Zealand<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">; to the south of Kiribati and to the <\/span><b>west of French Polynesia.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Named after Captain Cook, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">who <\/span><b>explored them in 1773,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the islands were <\/span><b>once autonomous, home to tribes of mixed Polynesian ancestry.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The islands cover a total land area of 240 sq. km.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They are divided into a <\/span><b>northern group of six islands<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and a <\/span><b>southern group of nine islands.<\/b>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Northern Islands<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: These are mostly <\/span><b>low-lying<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and <\/span><b>sparsely populated coral atolls;<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and include the islands of Manihiki, Nassau, Penrhyn, Pukapuka, Rakahanga, and Suwarrow and are covered in <\/span><b>light vegetation <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and equipped with stunning <\/span><b>white sand beaches.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Southern islands:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> These generally consist of much <\/span><b>larger, higher islands <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">that are <\/span><b>volcanic in origin <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and <\/span><b>more densely populated.<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> The southern island group includes <\/span><b>Rarotonga, Aitutaki,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Atiu, Mangaia, Manuae, Mauke, Mitiaro, Palmerston, and Takutea.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>distance between the two island groups is enormous.\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>highest point is Te Manga, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">which rises to 652 m on Rarotonga<\/span><b> Island.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Most of the population<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is found <\/span><b>on the island of Rarotonga.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Capital<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: <\/span><b>Avarua<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, which is <\/span><b>on Rarotonga island.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is a <\/span><b>self-governing island country in free association with New Zealand,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> an arrangement dating from August 1965.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Under the terms of the free association, <\/span><b>Cook Islanders hold New Zealand citizenship <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and enjoy the<\/span><b> right of free access to New Zealand and, by extension, Australia.<\/b><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>System of Government: Parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarchy.<\/b><b>Currency: NZ dollars (NZD)<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><b>Source<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.deccanherald.com\/world\/new-zealand-halts-cook-islands-funding-over-china-row-2-3593081\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">DH<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Cook Islands are a group of 15 small islands scattered across 2 million sq. km in the South Pacific Ocean, known for their natural beauty and Polynesian culture. Read more about Cook Islands, Location, Population, Capital, Currency, Latest News<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":23288,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[921,21,22,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-23287","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-cook-islands","9":"tag-prelims-pointers","10":"tag-upsc-current-affairs","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}