New Zealand is a South Pacific island nation, located some 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) to the southeast of Australia. The country consists of two main inhabited islands (the North and South Islands) and a number of smaller islands. New Zealand covers a total area of 268,680 square kilometers (103,737 square miles; about the same size as Colorado) and has a population of 4 million people. The main ethnic groups as of the last general census in 2001 were European (70.1%), Maori (14%), Asian (6.4%), and Pacific Islander (6.2%).

The first inhabitants of New Zealand were the Maori people, believed to have reached New Zealand from Polynesia in about C.E. 800. Europeans began settling in the country in a somewhat haphazard manner following the first European landing in 1769 by British explorer Captain James Cook (1728–1779). The authority of the various Maori tribes over New Zealand (or Aotearoa, as Maori termed the land) continued to be recognized until 1840, when...