Wellington - Winston Peters, leader of the nationalist New Zealand First party and former foreign minister, vowed Thursday to fight to cut immigration if he is in the government after next month's general election.

"Immigration numbers will be cut to ensure Kiwis do not have to compete with immigrants for jobs as our economy goes into decline," he said at a campaign meeting in Nelson, a coastal city on the north end of the South Island.

"When times are tough internationally, immigrants are attracted to New Zealand like moths to a neon light," Peters said.

Melbourne, October 15 : American authorities have frozen the assets of a New Zealand man living in Australia, who has been implicated in the world’s largest spam e-mail operation.

The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) fingered Lance Atkinson, 26, who lives in Pelican Waters in Queensland, as a ringleader of the network that was responsible for sending out billions of unsolicited emails in recent years.

The commission, which has been successful in having the spam network shut down, had requested a US district court in Chicago to freeze Atkinson’s assets.

Wellington - New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark has flushed an energy-saving proposal to limit the flow of water in household showers down the gurgler after the public made it clear it was very cold on the idea, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

Clark, who is fighting an election campaign to retain her job, ordered Building and Construction Minister Shane Jones to ditch a proposal to limit new showers to a flow of six litres a minute after a public outcry, the New Zealand Herald reported.

Wellington - The New Zealand stock market - the first to open every day - jumped more than 6 per cent in the first hour of trading Tuesday after a spectacular recovery on Wall Street.

The benchmark NZX 50 index, which fell just under 1 per cent on Monday after slumping 4.7 per cent on Friday, rose 189 points to 2,971 in early dealing.

Analysts said that bargain-hunting investors had taken a lead from Wall Street, which posted its biggest-ever one-day gains.

Wellington - The New Zealand stock market - the first to open every day - jumped more than 6 per cent in the first hour of trading Tuesday after a spectacular recovery on Wall Street.

The benchmark NZX 50 index, which fell just under 1 per cent on Monday after slumping 4.7 per cent on Friday, rose 189 points to 2,971 in early dealing.

Analysts said that bargain-hunting investors had taken a lead from Wall Street, which posted its biggest-ever one-day gains.