...[W]hen Thabo Mbeki, South Africa's president, delivered his state of the nation address to parliament 10 days ago, he gave a glowing reference to De Beers. Mr Mbeki was saluting it for agreeing to help run a state diamond trading company as part of the government's push for "beneficiation" - allowing local cutters and polishers to benefit from the nation's mineral wealth...[A]n extraordinary courtship of the government that has seen De Beers go from being its whipping boy to almost its poster child of black empowerment...Analysts believe that De Beers' enthusiasm for the new deal was fuelled by its desire to offset the message of Blood Diamond, the Leonardo DiCaprio film about the role diamond mining plays in African wars...Now, however, with figures suggesting that US sales were not affected, Mr Penny [De Beers managing director] likes to applaud the film as a way of educating the public about the industry.