Media Release

30 August 2001

Prime Minister Issues Clear Invitation to Asylum Seekers - Peters

The Rt Hon Winston Peters MP, Leader of New Zealand First, today said that the Prime Minister’s comments that hundreds of asylum seekers on a Norwegian cargo ship off Christmas Island would be allowed into New Zealand if the boat came our way is sending a clear invitation for just that to happen.

“Refugee camps cost a fortune whilst trying to sort out whether the refugees are genuine or not. Over the years New Zealanders have become a soft touch for these sorts of things – determining our immigration policy on an ad hoc basis. Moreover, there is significant criminality in New Zealand’s big cities today as a result of totally inadequate security checks on immigrants in the late 80s and 90s and that has continued despite numerous warnings by those in the know.

“Four years ago New Zealand was threatened with a similar influx of two boat loads of asylum seekers from Asia. As Deputy Prime Minister, I did not believe we should have let them enter New Zealand and my view has not changed since then,” said Mr Peters.

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>>