Show some respect to Colonel John Masters. How dare you call him an idiot and imply he is scared of anything, let alone insurgents. There are a lot of men in NZ who would punch you for that, and they would be right.

Colonel Masters was in the jungle and the swamps fighting terrorists when your father was a blip on your grandfather’s radar screen. He commanded New Zealand volunteers in the Vietnam war, and was decorated for his bravery. He then led the long fight at home to get recognition and help for our men and what they want through. Now he bravely bares the burden of serious illness in what should be golden years.

If you were a man rather than the immature boy I suspect you are, you would apologise.

Colonel Masters has more intelligence and courage in his pinkie finger than you have in your whole body.
In the event you don’t, I say something the Colonel would be too much of a gentleman to utter:

Fuck you, “somewhatthoughtful”, may you rot in Hell.

The risk arises with those Muslim foreign post-graduate students who come to NZ to enrol in Masters or Doctoral programmes in the pure sciences, where independent research is required of them and that allows them much more autonomy.

Also many of them can only afford to study here because of scholarships provided by their own Governments, so that has the potential for exploitation too. If their Government’s security people want to talk with them when they are back home for their summer holidays, they are not going to react in the way the TEU has here in New Zealand today!

Interesting post. Sounds as though the Education Department mirrors teacher unions in being thoroughly pro-Labour.

Activism such as this usually remains at low level and is usually an annoyance rather than a real threat in
New Zealand, but we should not let ourselves be lulled into a false sense of security and contentment,
despite the protestations of Keith Locke and others who see the world in a different hue.

Can we really dismiss this initiative, given that we have a highly regarded tertiary education system where
overseas students in vast numbers study a range of subjects that could have any number of outcomes and
violent applications? Can we afford a failure of imagination that blinds us to the absolute worst possible
end use of the information imparted? Granted, the information in the Anarchists Cookbook is freely and
readily available, but possible consequences dictate we should be more wary.

Paranoia aside, while academics protest about becoming de-facto intelligence agents, they should not be
entirely comfortable with giving unfettered information to all and sundry. In all likelihood, there is no
overt risk within our universities, but that cannot blind academics to the fact that certain information,
placed in the hands of the wrong person at the wrong time, could have devastating consequences. While
little consideration has been given to this matter by some, we should be glad that those who we have
entrusted these matters to, are more circumspect in their thinking.

Paul G. Buchanan’s Kiwipolitico blog link in his 1.27 post points to lack of security vetting under Labour of 1000 Pakistani and 350 Saudi and UAE students at NZ universities.

I came up against this when I worked in Foreign Affairs. The truth is that the SIS were dogmatic in always opposing any liberalisation in allowing in students from muslim country’s because of the terrorism risk.

But the SIS was just one of a number of departments consulted on this type of policy change and they were a voice in the wind, up against Foreign Affairs, the Trade people, and especially the Education Department all wanting to allow the students in because it made NZ “look good”, earned foreign currency and gave much desired funding to schools.

Anyone who has ever worked in central Government on policy issues will know that all affected departments are always consulted, and conflicting agency views are presented to Cabinet, but in the end it’s Cabinet that makes the final decision, and they are accountable if there has been inadequate vetting of foreign students, not the SIS. Cabinet accepted the risk.

NOOKS R BAD! DEAF 2 AMERIKKKA! DEAF 2 NASHUNAL!

Alright then.

And, of course, there’s Ry Sprrrorlrorlololol, demonstrating his anti-Western moral equivilency in the way only a braindead member of AUSA can.

For goodness’ sake, if you’re going to make random unsupported assertions, at least spell them correctly.

No, they did not make a statutory declaration. That declaration that we only seem to impose on American ships whic of course no military in its right mind would ever give.”
******************************************

How do you know?

One of my lecturers in microbiology happily admitted to his class that he had smuggled some experimental bugs required for wine and beer brewing into the country in test-tubes in his jacket pocket, then proceeded to describe how to multiply them up at home. No consideration for biosecurity issues which surprised me as he was a Professor at one of the country’s two Agricultural Universities (and today quite applicable to spreading harmful microbes. A chemistry lecturer demonstrated nitrating the Toluene molecule and just how to get three nitrogen atoms attached (TNT). Great home-brew for anyone with destructive tendencies.

The first example is disturbing, foolish, and potentially quite relevant to terrorist activity.

However there is nothing surprising about the chemistry lecturer demonstrating nitration of an aromatic organic compound – it demonstrates several key concepts in synthetic organic chemistry such as ortho/para and meta direction (IE how to get the nitro group, or indeed any group you wish to attach in the position(s) you want it to attach to about an aromatic ring). In fact making a more stable – but similar compound to TNT through the same method is part of the lab course in stage two organic chemistry. This is not a security concern as there are already instructions on how to make TNT and more dangerous substances available on the internet – both in rubbish like the Anarchist’s cookbook, wikipedia and in scientific journal websites, which anyone attending a university can freely browse.

I presume the main thing the SIS actually wants information on is someone trying to obtain chemicals/equipment to make explosives/poisonous gas/bacteria/refined uranium.

Yeah, me neither. I like the nuke-free policy. It would be nice if more countries followed NZ’s lead and we could block out whole regions as nuke-free.

If we had a major earthquake and one of our big cities was smashed, would all you anti-nukers mind a fecking big carrier tying up in Wellington Harbour or in Auckland and supplying electricity – like they did for the ungrateful bastards in Indonesia after the tsunami in 2004?

Therefore, having discovered this, at relatively little cost to the organisation/s concerned (and they are, after all well used to derision from those with ‘vested interests’), life will go on as before, the information that has been gained through this latest exercise will be filed and appropriate notes and actions will be taken.

Nothing changes – information is still gathered and those who need to know such things are advised.

Be thankful that it is so (and hope that it never changes). . .