September 25, 2003	Thursday	Rajab 27, 1424

WELLINGTON, Sept 24: New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark on Wednesday condemned an attack on United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan by the country’s leading current affairs broadcaster Paul Holmes who called him a “cheeky darkie” on his morning radio show.

Dubbing Holmes’s comments “completely unacceptable”, she said, “It is demeaning of one of the world’s top international civil servants and I would not want New Zealand to be in any way associated with such comments.”

Holmes apologised earlier, saying he “surrendered to baseness” when saying on his daily nationwide Newstalk ZB programme that the world was not going to be told how to live by a Ghanaian.

“It was an appalling thing to say,” he was quoted as saying on the website of Television New Zealand where he also hosts a high-rating current affairs programme every weeknight.

“I think I felt like breaking out...whatever I am I’m not a racist,” Holmes said.

However, he stuck to his criticism of the United Nations, saying, “Half of that General Assembly sitting there looking down their noses at George Bush represent some of the most pernicious regimes in the world, some of whom probably survive on American favour.

“It’s absurd to say the United Nations kept the peace for 58 years,” he said.—dpa