Clark Calls Shipley To Discuss Timor At APEC - Calls for our Government to take a stronger stance over the situation in East Timor. Fires are burning throughout Dili and there are reports that about 100 people have been killed overnight. Labour leader Helen Clark accuses Indonesia for abandoning the streets of East Timor to the militia which it armed in the first place. She told Newstalk ZB that Prime Minister Jenny Shipley as chair of APEC must make sure East Timor is high on the agenda at this week’s summit, and not just discussed as a fringe issue. Ms Clark says Indonesia is one of the largest countries attending APEC and other member nations cannot ignore the issue.

UN Security Council Meets - The UN security council is meeting now to discuss the East Timor crisis - New Zealand foreign Minister Don McKinnon has warned that the council does not move quickly - and says the council’s response is likely to take the form of pressure on Indonesia’s Government to stop the supply of guns and support to the militia. He says continual diplomatic pressure is the most likely outcome of this morning’s meeting.

Student’s Behaviour Drives Teachers Out - The PPTA claims stress and overwork will drive at least 150 secondary school teachers out of the classroom at the end of this year. A survey of 116 schools found 63 teachers had already left the profession this year while a further 92 will leave before the year is out. PPTA president says it is largely because of increasingly bad student behaviour.

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>