Third NZ tsunami victim identified

June Kander

A 74-year-old New Zealander living in Canada has been named as one of the victims of the Boxing Day tsunami in the Indian Ocean.

June Kander died in Sri Lanka, her nephew Kevin Worsley, of Masterton, confirmed today.

Mr Worsley told NZPA his aunt's body had been identified by a fellow traveller who was with Mrs Kander in Sri Lanka, and her body had been cremated.

Her remains would be returned to her son Brandon in Quebec, where Mrs Kander had lived since the late 1960s.

"Details of how she died are still sketchy, but we believe her body was found in a building with her passport and identification papers nearby."

Mrs Kander was raised in Greymouth and Auckland. She earned a PhD in English literature, and was a linguistics education curriculum specialist who was still lecturing at the time of her death.

Mr Worsley said his aunt was an enthusiastic traveller who had been in Laos recently and she had sent him a card to say she was travelling to Sri Lanka for a holiday.

"That was the last I heard from her," he said.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Helen Clark said while five New Zealanders were missing in affected areas in southern Thailand, another 106 were still unaccounted throughout Thailand.

"While the five has come down from where it's been, some people move in and out of those two categories. It's a very worrying time for some New Zealand families," Miss Clark told National Radio.

"There's no real information (about the missing)."

The Red Cross estimates 155,000 people have died in tsunami-struck areas.

- NZPA