The Australian Prime Minister, Mr John Howard, bowed to two years of public pressure yesterday by making a qualified apology to Australia's so-called stolen generations of Aboriginal children.
His statement, which expressed the nation's "deep and sincere regret" for past mistreatment, left Aboriginals bitterly divided over whether it went far enough.
The Labor Party opposition refused to support the statement in the Lower House, arguing that the trauma of indigenous people would continue until Mr Howard made an unqualified apology using the word "sorry".
Mr Howard called on parliament to renew its commitment to reconciliation with Australia's 400,000 indigenous people, who make up 2 per cent of the population and suffer its worst poverty and poorest health.
Mr Howard said "the mistreatment of many indigenous Australians over a significant period represents the most blemished chapter in our national history".
But he reiterated the belief, given as his reason for not apologising earlier, that present generations should not be held accountable for the mistakes of the past.
"Nor should we ever forget that many people, who were involved in some of the practices which caused hurt and trauma, felt at the time that those practices were properly based," he said.
His statement echoed the sentiments of a maiden speech by newly-elected Australian Democrats Senator Aiden Ridgeway, the second Aborigine to be elected to the upper house.
Many Australian Aboriginals were left scarred physically or emotionally after being separated from their families in what is now acknowledged to have been a misguided attempt to assimilate them into white society by placing them in the care of white families or institutions.
A 1987 Human Rights Commission report recommended compensation for the victims of a policy it described as "genocide".
Mr Howard's statement came as an Aboriginal victim of the policy lost her 11-year legal fight for damages in a test case against the New South Wales government.
Ms Joy Williams (56), who claimed she suffered sexual, physical and psychiatric abuse, had sued the state for breaching its duty of care when it assumed guardianship of her and put her in various institutions.
Supreme Court Judge Alan Abadee found the state was not negligent and there was no common law duty of care imposed on the Aboriginal Welfare Board which took her in.
Canberra is continuing to fight a separate damages action involving two other middle-aged victims in the Federal Court in Darwin.
Another Aboriginal leader, Mr Tracker Tilmouth, director of the Central Land Council, condemned Mr Howard's statement as "limp-wristed and a bit soft" and told ABC radio it could only be acceptable if it included the word "sorry".
Central Australian Stolen Generations Aboriginal Corporation spokesman, Mr Harold Furber, said: "How can they be serious about regret while they pour millions of dollars into fighting our compensation claim tooth and nail?"