New Zealand government accused of blogger 'dirty tricks'
The New Zealand government has been accused of illegally accessing opposition party computers and feeding information to bloggers as part of a political "dirty tricks" campaign, it was alleged today.
NZ PM John Key
The allegations, from investigative journalist Nicky Hagar, threaten to derail the New Zealand National party's campaign in a general election due to take place six weeks from today.
Hagar, who has a long history of exposing government corruption has alleged that staff, employed by Prime Minister John Key, fed information gathered by the security services to bloggers to attack, and hacked computers belonging to the main opposition party to provide material for personal attacks it's leadership.
"You are not going to believe how bloody awful it is", the journalist told a packed book launch in Wellington last night.
Key attempted to fend off the book's allegations yesterday telling reporters "most people know that Nicky Hager is a screaming left-wing conspiracy theorist. He's hardly an authority on these matters".
However Hagar, who is widely credited with fatally undermining previous National party leader Don Brash by exposing his links with a controversial religious group, said people will be "increasingly astonished as they read through the book because the "dirty politics only got worse."
The allegations echo a previous UK political scandal when a senior advisor to Gordon Brown, Damien McBride, resigned after emails revealed he was planning to set up a blog called "red rag" which would be used to publish false stories about the sex lives of Conservative party politicians.