SYDNEY — "Sorry," the hardest word in the English language to say, has been said by Australia to its Aborigines — officially, by Parliament in Canberra, in a ceremony screened in every city and set on the record to right the wrongs inflicted on them since white settlement began in 1788.
And already the bickering has begun. How do we undo 200 years of cruelties? How much money will Aborigines demand in compensation? And will all the apologies simply divide the nation and set in train a legacy of bitter disputes?
The "sorry ceremony" is the first legislation enacted by the new Labor government of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. It fulfills a contentious election promise and sets a fast reformist pace that will mark, or mar, the Rudd administration over the next three years.