THE WITCHES WIN:

'Cleansed' Greenland cabinet falls (Andrew Osborn, January 11, 2003, The Guardian)

The Greenland government collapsed yesterday because of a row about a phenomenon associated more commonly with the medieval period rather than the 21st century: witchcraft.

The world's biggest island may be a semi-autonomous province of Denmark, one of the EU's most self-consciously modernist members, but yesterday's events suggest the two are worlds apart.

The Arctic territory's home rule government, in office for only 37 days, fell apart because of its senior civil servant's penchant for what some politicians called "witch-doctoring and
other mumbo jumbo" and others "plain exorcism".

The affair centres on the activities of Jens Lyberth, who called upon the services of a healer to drive evil spirits from the government's offices in Nuuk, Greenland's capital. [...]

Many Greenlandic politicians saw Mr Lyberth's recourse to witchcraft as embarrassing and unacceptable.

It was, they said, a stain on the island's image which made it the laughing stock of Denmark and the international community.

So, which would you rather have appear in a story about you: the Pete Townshend quote, "I am not a paedophile"; or, he's the "laughing stock of Denmark"? Posted by Orrin Judd at January 14, 2003 7:50 PM