Hon Murray McCully
Minister of Foreign Affairs

7 December 2012

NZ assists typhoon victims

Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully today announced New Zealand will provide $500,000 to the International Federation of the Red Cross Appeal to help those most in need following Typhoon Bopha in the Philippines.

"More than 400 lives have been confirmed lost during this disaster and a further 383 are missing. Around 230,000 people are thought to have been affected, with homes, roads, bridges, power and communications infrastructure either damaged or destroyed," Mr McCully says.

"New Zealand’s funding will be made immediately available for essential relief items such as food, clean water and shelter.

"Assessments are on-going and New Zealand will consider additional assistance if needed.”

ENDS

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Arguably Reassuring: Inspector-General Finds GCSB "Arguably" Legal

Of the 88 individuals:

• 15 cases involving 22 individuals did not have any information intercepted by GCSB.

• another four cases involving five individuals were the subjects of a New Zealand Security Intelligence Service warrant and the GCSB assisted in the execution of the warrants. The Inspector-General is of the view that there were arguably no breaches and the law is unclear.

• the Bureau only provided technical assistance which did not involve interception of communications, involving three of the individuals, so no breach occurred.

• the remaining cases involved the collection of metadata, and the Inspector-General formed the view that there had arguably been no breach, noting once again that the law is unclear.
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