MFAT Tsunami Update 13 At 1230 On Saturday 1 December

1 Thailand: New Zealand officials in Bangkok at 0600 NZtime today advised that their database now has 882 names. Of these, 601 are now confirmed OK, two are confirmed deceased, and 7 are in hospitals in Bangkok and in the affected areas (8 were earlier discharged). 36 New Zealanders are still missing from the affected areas, and a further 236 are unaccounted for and thought to have been somewhere in Thailand.

2 The Disaster Victim Identification and emergency response teams arrived on Friday and will operate at Phang Nga (as well as at Phuket and Krabi)

3 Sri Lanka : NZ High Commissioner has been in touch with our Honorary Consul in Colombo. There are no reports of New Zealanders affected beyond the four on whom enquiries continue (see earlier updates that noted there were four persons on whom enquiries had been issued in Sri Lanka, and four in India, none thought to be in affected areas).

4 India: There are no reports of other affected New Zealanders in India or in the Andamans and Nicobar.

5 New Zealand will attend the aid summit meeting due to be held in Jakarta on 6 January. Details on attendance will follow when to hand.

© Scoop Media

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>>