Media Statement
Sunday, 29 April 2001

Oxfam report welcomed

Education is one of the keys to the future of the Pacific, Associate Foreign Affairs Minister (Responsible for Development Aid) Matt Robson said today.

He welcomed an Oxfam New Zealand report Basic Education and Pacific Peoples, released today. It stresses the importance of basic education in the South Pacific.

Matt Robson said he had just received a major independent review of New Zealand's Overseas Development Assistance.

"The Oxfam report is a well-researched contribution and will be a useful supplement to the independent review. Both will help the Government to set its directions for aid.

"Education is a fundamentally important sector for development aid. New Zealand also places a strong emphasis on eliminating poverty, and programmes such as a mobile health clinic for Samoa that I launched last week.

"It is important to get the balance of these programmes right.

"I am pleased that Oxfam has applauded the level of aid New Zealand provides to the South Pacific for education and I will consider its report carefully," Matt Robson said.

ENDS

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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>>