Offstream
news

New Zealand moves COVID-19 traffic light settings for Auckland from red to orange, allowing bars, restaurants and cafes that enforce the vaccine pass requirement to remove crowd size limits and requirements to sit down, despite fears of community transmission of the Omicron variant.
2021-12-31

New Zealand reports their first community cases of COVID-19 since January 24. The patients are a family from Auckland.
2021-02-14

Niuean MP Terry Coe says there is "growing concern" over the absence of Premier Toke Talagi, who is reportedly undergoing medical treatment in New Zealand and has not been seen in public since July and, prior to that, early April. Coe says Niue's citizens are concerned that the state affairs are seemingly being conducted from New Zealand, and the island nation's acting premier has held power for an unusually long period of time due to Talagi's absence.
2019-09-6

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announces a ban of all military-style semi-automatic weapons, assault rifles and high-capacity magazines following the Christchurch mosque shootings. An amnesty is in effect for people who return their guns.
2019-03-21

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern goes into labour with her first child. Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters is now Acting Prime Minister, and will be for six weeks while Ardern is on maternity leave.
2018-06-20

Seven survivors from the MV "Butiraoi", six adults and a baby, are found in a dinghy and rescued, four days after the 50-passenger ferry sank in Kiribati. New Zealand rescuers say there is a lot of debris near the dinghy, but no sign of anyone else.
2018-01-28

In New Zealand's North Island heavy rains cause flooding on the Kapiti Coast in the Wellington Region prompting evacuations and closing road and rail links.
2015-05-14

Voters in New Zealand go to the polls for a general election.
2014-09-20

Official alternative names are announced for the North Island and South Island of New Zealand with Te Ika-a-Maui and Te Waipounamu as the respective Maori language names.
2013-10-10

The Whakaari - White Island volcano in the Bay of Plenty off New Zealand's North Island erupts.
2013-08-20