Earlier this week we reported on a story run by Bloomberg in which Sony Computer Entertainment of America CEO Jack Tretton stated that due to the natural disaster which affected Japan last month, the company’s next generation portable console, NGP, is not likely to make its planned global release later this year.

Sony Spokesperson Satoshi Fukuoaka has now refuted the story, telling Wall Street Journal that “so far we see no impact from the quake on our launch plan”.

These are two conflicting statements both coming from authoritative figures at Sony Computer Entertainment, so it is difficult to tell what the eventual outcome will be. On one hand, Fukuoaka’s statement may be designed to protect Sony share prices, but on the other, it may well be the case that Sony Japan has found a way to overcome the challenges faced by the quake and resultant tsunami, and that a global 2011 NGP launch is still in the cards.