Poor South African Ambassador to Canada. He had a diplomatic answer to everything. A diplomatic answer is described as an answer that incriminates all other parties though you are clearly at fault. That's how the seminar proceeded through questions about South Africa's arms legacy, corporate behaviour, somewhat hegemonic attitude, crippling poverty, crippling foreign trade policies, crippling AIDS rates, and crippling unemployment. Not to mention the ethics-starved approach to Zimbabwe, Angola, the DRC, Mozambique, and East Africa.
He did say that SA treasured its special relationship with Canada because of the trade embargoes initiated by Mulroney against the apartheid government. That was nice of Mulroney. We probably owed South Africa anyways, since it was our policies against native people that provided the model for the apartheid government in the first place.
If I was there, I would have demanded the immediate destruction of all vuvuzelas. Diplomacy can only go so far.
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