http://www.abc.net.au/new...219706.htm

New Prince video stirs controversy
Provocative US singer Prince is stirring up controversy with the release of a new video featuring Oscar-nominated New Zealand actress Keisha Castle-Hughes as a suicide bomber.

The artist's politically-charged new video Cinnamon Girl shows the Whale Rider star as a mixed-race schoolgirl facing taunts from classmates over her ethnicity after a terrorist attack.

Later on in the four-minute music video, which features the teenage actress against drawn backdrops, her character appears to push a button to blow herself up in a crowded airport terminal.

The video, due to be released next month, appeared on Prince's website less than three weeks before the November 2 election in which terrorism and the threat to the United States is the hottest election issue.

The lyrics of the song tell of the trauma of a girl of bi-racial descent battling prejudice following the September 11, 2001 attacks that sparked an initial wave of attacks against Arab Americans.

"Cinnamon Girl of mixed heritage; Never knew the meaning of colour lines; 9/11 turned that all around; When she got accused of this crime," the lyrics say.

"So began the mass illusion; War on terror alibi; what's the use when the god of confusion; Keeps on telling the same lie?," Prince sings in an apparent dig at President George W Bush's war of terror.

Prince's representatives could not immediately be reached for comment.

Castle-Hughes' agent Graham Dunster told the New Zealand Herald earlier this week that the scene was fantasy and the character was reflecting on the consequences of a bombing.

"In the context of the song lyrics, there is nothing to be aggrieved about," he said.

--AFP