NZ pays tribute to Muldoon

AUCKLAND (Reuter) - Some 2,000 people packed Auckland City Hall yesterday for the funeral service of New Zealand's former prime minister, Sir Robert Muldoon, the country's most colourful politician since the Second World War. The ceremony, marked by an unscheduled Maori tribute from leather-jacketed gang members, bade farewell to the prickly, often abrasive politician, who died on Wednesday aged 70.

Muldoon led the government from 1975 to 1984. He had requested an 'ordinary bloke's' funeral, matching his down-to- earth personal and political lifestyle.