WELLINGTON: New Zealand`s parliament on Thursday handed record-long suspensions to three Indigenous Maori lawmakers who last year staged a protest haka on the debating floor.

Maori Party co-leaders Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer were banished from parliament for 21 days, the longest-ever suspension. Fellow Maori Party lawmaker Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, New Zealand`s youngest current MP, was suspended for seven days.

The bans stem from a haka performed during voting in November on the contentious Treaty Principles Bill, which sought to redefine the principles of a key pact between Maori and the government. Waititi held up a noose as he rose to speak in dehance of the ban on Thursday. `In my maiden speech, I talked about one of our (ancestors) who was hung in the gallows of Mt Eden Prison, wrongfully accused,` Waititi said. `The silencing of us today is a reminder of the silencing of our ancestors of the past, and it continues to happen. `Now you`ve traded the noose for legislation. Well, we will not be silenced.` Although performed on many different occasions, haka are often used as a kind of ceremonial war dance or challenge to authority.

New Zealand`s foreign affairs minister Winston Peters earlier mocked Waititi for his traditional full-face Maori tattoo. `The Maori Party are a bunch of extremists, and middle New Zealand and the Maori world has had enough of them,` said Peters, who is also Maori. -AFP