Kia ora koutou and welcome to your New Zealand newsletter.

First up, The Conversation is looking for an experienced senior journalist to join me in early 2020 to cover politics, business and the humanities. Please help us reach people who would be interested in this role and share widely among your networks. Applications close on December 9.

And now to this week’s coverage.

Late on Friday, the jury returned a guilty verdict in the Grace Millane murder trial. The three-week trial seized front pages, with article after article fixated on details of her personal history. Daisy Richards at De Montfort University argues that this treatment is part of a much larger media trend in how violence against women is represented.

Despite disruptions to global value chains, the 18-month trade tensions between the US and China appear to have left New Zealand exporters unscathed so far. But Hongzhi Gao and Ivy Guo, at Victoria University of Wellington, warn this is no reason for complacency.

Last month, a Court of Appeal decision set a precedent, allowing offenders to argue their drug addiction should be considered a mitigating factor. The change is part of an overhaul of guidelines used by judges since 2005 and Lisa Marriott, also at VUW, argues this approach should extend to other crimes where poverty, deprivation or addiction play a key role in the offending.

And the Climate Explained series continues, this week with Shaun Hendy, at Te Pūnaha Matatini, looking into how much flying contributes to climate change.

Many thanks for reading. You’ll find much more on the New Zealand page and The Conversation’s Australian and other international editions. He mihi nui ki a koutou katoa.