Last Sunday, July 28, 2013, investigative author Nicky Hager accused New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) of spying Kiwi journalist Jon Stephenson while working on an Afghanistan assignment. Mr Hager said that the spying was done through a U.S. intelligence contact.

"There were New Zealand defence personal who had in their hands reports of Jon Stephenson's calls-his metadata."

Mr Hager explained that the metadata were used to keep track of Mr Stephenson's journalistic contacts.

Last Monday, July 29, 2013, Mr Hager also made accusations that the (NZDF) labelled journalists as subversives and subjected them to other forms of security threats.

"The thing that was shocking about this is that you had the Defence Force who are public servants who are writing down that they saw journalists, investigative journalists, as a threat to state," Mr Hager said in an interview with ONE News.

The New Zealand Government expressed deep concern and called on the NZDF to get rid of the military policy that allows them to call on journalists as threat to national security.

However, NZDF officials were now ducking for cover as the issue puts them on the hot seat.

According to NZDF

As for the accusation of spying, Defence Minister Jonathan Coleman and NZDF said that Mr Hager had no evidence to support the claim.

In a report from New Zealand Herald, Mr Coleman said, there was no evidence supporting allegations of the military spying Mr Stephenson in Afghanistan.

"The evidence is no such metadata collection was ever performed on Mr Stephenson. The collection of metadata on behalf of the NZDF by the U.S. would not be a legitimate practice when practiced on an NZ citizen," Mr Coleman said regarding the military search of records back to New Zealand's first participation in Afghanistan.

As for the subversive labels referring to journalists, Mr Coleman assures that NZDF was already doing its review of policy to "remove those references."

"I have asked the Defence Force to review these particular orders to ensure they are fir for purpose. A review is timely given that these orders are now a decade old. I don't think it is appropriate that journalists are described in that way in that order. So I have asked the NZDF to go back, look at those orders which have been in pace for a decade, check they're still fit for purpose, rewrite those orders appropriately and to remove those references in the way that they're expressed," Mr Coleman said.

"We have identified no information at this time that supports Mr Hager's claim," Major General Tim Keating said, expressing assurance that there was no spying that took place.

"Now it's been highlighted you know I agree it appears to be a heavy-handed order," Mr Coleman strongly denied, when asked if he knew of the policy labelling journalists as subversive.

"We don't monitor journalists and we're not in the business of monitoring journalists. We are the guys who have been standing up for the journalists... Neither SIS or GCSB have undertaken any surveillance on Jon Stephenson," said Prime Minister John Key, backing the Defence Force.

A random check in the policy showed that it was former Chief of Defence Sir Bruce Ferguson who issued the policy in 2003 and, again, in 2005.

However, Sir Bruce denied the accusation and was unaware of the "subversive" label.