Labour Leader Helen Clark today paid tribute to the United States' Air Force crews responsible for an emergency airdrop of medical supplies for a woman scientist wintering over at the South Pole.

"It was a high-risk exercise which was carried out with a great deal of skill and valour, in dark and freezing conditions.

"My congratulations go to the United States Air Force for successfully completing what one of its commanders has described as one of its most challenging peacetime missions.

"I would like to convey my best wishes to the American woman who has a lump in her breast, but cannot leave the remote South Pole station for treatment until the end of the polar winter in October.

"I am sure the woman's plight and the humanitarian mission will strike a chord with New Zealanders, who recognise the immense value of the scientific work carried out in the Antarctica in what, at this time of year, must be extremely difficult conditions," Helen Clark said.

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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>>