Govt won't tell athletes not to go to India

The New Zealand Government is not telling sports teams to avoid playing in India following terror threats against international sporting events there, says Prime Minister John Key.

A Pakistani militant with links to al-Qaeda, Ilyas Kashmiri, warned the international community against sending competitors to the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket competition, hockey's World Cup and the Commonwealth Games in October.

Five athletes and a manager from the New Zealand Shooting Federation landed in Delhi overnight for the Commonwealth shooting championships, which are held every two years.

Spokesman Gavin Paton said there were no plans to make different arrangements for the team and they had not been specifically mentioned in the terror threat.

"But we'll just take each day at a time," he said.

The Black Sticks men's hockey team is in Perth to play Australia in two tests and will now stay there until further notice while authorities assess the situation in India, where the World Cup is due to start next week.

The safety of the players, coaches and team management was of paramount importance and it made sense to further assess the situation before sending the team to Delhi, said Hockey NZ chief executive Hilary Poole.

Mr Key said it was up to the sporting bodies to make the final decision on whether to travel to India.

At this stage he was not in a position to assess whether or not the threats were real. The Government could give an advisory not to travel, but that would have to be off the back of information convincing authorities here that there was a real and credible threat to athletes, he said.

Mr Key said security for travelling athletes would largely come from within India and discussions here had not gone down the road of whether individual teams would need to boost their own security.

NZ Olympic Committee president Mike Stanley said his organisation would keep a "watching brief" on developments and liaise with the Government and Commonwealth Games Federation over coming days.

"Obviously we take any threat at this stage very seriously," Mr Stanley told Radio Sport.

Mr Stanley said the NZOC has not considered the possibility of pulling out of the Commonwealth Games in Delhi from October 3 to 14.

New Zealand chef de mission Dave Currie will visit the region next month to be further briefed on security. "We'll get as much information as we can so we can make an informed decision," Mr Stanley said.

He said the security system set up in Delhi for the Games was both expensive and elaborate, with one central security group established to co-ordinate military, police and special forces.

Mr Stanley said all New Zealand Commonwealth Games athletes had the right to pull out if they felt their safety was threatened.

"Their own assessment of individual safety is a fundamental individual right," he said.

New Zealand Cricket Players Association chief executive Heath Mills said the association had already been working with an independent Australian security firm on safety measures for New Zealand cricket players taking part in the IPL.

That process had been happening for the last couple of weeks since a threat had been made on February 4 by a terrorist organisation against three cities, including New Delhi.

"The fact that they made that threat...and then with the latest one overnight -- it needs to be taken extremely seriously." The association's security adviser would take the latest warning into account and would be providing them with a security report within the next week, Mr Mills said.

"Although I'd have to say, having been through a number of these situations before, I think this recent threat will have to cast serious doubt on whether (the tournament) will go ahead."