diff -ur orig/aptBackend.py new/aptBackend.py
--- orig/aptBackend.py	2010-05-02 18:13:45.850809885 +0300
+++ new/aptBackend.py	2010-05-02 18:14:03.348323325 +0300
@@ -1495,7 +1495,7 @@
             #        reporting. We only receive a failure string.
             # FIXME: Doesn't detect if all downloads failed - bug in python-apt
             self.message(MESSAGE_REPO_METADATA_DOWNLOAD_FAILED,
-                         format_string(error.message))
+                         format_string(str(error.message)))
         self._open_cache(prange=(95,100))
         self.percentage(100)