German Lies About Sheep – Opinion Polls – Fiji – Israel – Foot and Mouth – Stockmarket Crash - NSW Floods – Peter Ellis Report – Climate Outlook

GERMAN LIES ABOUT SHEEP: The Minister of Agriculture still believes the Germans deliberately tried to suggest to German consumers that NZ Meat has scrapie and to link it with German consumer concerns about German beef.

OPINION POLLS: NZ First Leader Winston Peters will need Government support to ban opinion polls in the four weeks before a general election.

FIJI: Fiji’s Great Council of Chiefs resume a meeting today to decide where to go from here. The council are expected to appoint a new President or back the present one.

ISRAEL: A Palestinian Man has been killed in clashes in the West Bank town of Ramallah. The Palestinian Health Minister has warned that a health crisis is looming in the Palestinian territories.

FOOT AND MOUTH: Airline and Tourism companies say they will cooperate with the government to combat the arrival of Foot and Mouth disease in NZ. The number of Foot and Mouth cases in Britain has risen to 168.

STOCK CRASH: The NASDAQ New York stock index has lost nearly 5% overnight falling below 2000 points. The drop followed a warning by Intel and a jobs layoff announcement by Cisco Systems. The index is down 60% from its high. The Dow Jones Index has plunged more than 200 points.

NSW FLOODS: Officials say it could take up to four days for flood waters to drop in flooded parts of northern New South Wales.

PETER ELLIS REPORT: A judicial report into the Peter Ellis case is to be made public today. Peter Ellis has always maintained his innocence of child abuse charges he served jail time for.

CLIMATE OUTLOOK: NIWA has just released a climate outlook for the next few months predicting only average or below average rainfall in Marlborough. This will not be enough to allay fire concerns in the area.

© Scoop Media

Alastair Thompson

Scoop Publisher

Alastair Thompson is the co-founder of Scoop. He is of Scottish and Irish extraction and from Wellington, New Zealand. Alastair has 24 years experience in the media, at the Dominion, National Business Review, North & South magazine, Straight Furrow newspaper and online since 1997. He is the winner of several journalism awards for business and investigative work.

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