S/PV.1991 Security Council

In accordance with the decisions taken by the Council at previous meetings, I invite the representatives of Algeria, Bahrain, Botswana, Egypt, Guinea, Indonesia, Liberia, Madagascar, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka, the Syrian Arab Republic, Yugoslavia and Zambia to take the places reserved for them at the side of the Council chamber. At the invitation of the President, Mr. A. Rahal (Algeria), Mr. S. M. Al Saffar (Bahrain), Mr, T. Tlou (Botswna), Mr. A. E. Abdel Meguid (Egypt), Mr. M, S. Camara (Guinea), Mrq A. Marpaung (Indonesia), Mrs. A. Brooks- Randolph (Liberia), Mr. H. Rasolondraibe (Madagascar), Mr. L. 0. Harriman (Nigeria), Mr. M Fall (Senegal), Mrs. S. Y; Gbujama (Sierra Leone), Mr. 1: B. Fonseka (Sri Lanka), Mr. M. Allaf (Syrian Arab Republic), Mr. J. Petri6 (Yugoslavia) and Mr. D. W. Kamana (Zambia) took the places reserved for them at the side of the Council chamber.

In addition, I should like to inform members of the Council that letters have been received from the representatives of Ghana, Kenya, Mauritania, the United Republic of Tanzania and Zaire in which they request to be invited to participate in the discussion of the question on the Council’s agenda. Accordingly, I propose, in accordance with the usual practice and with the consent of the Council, to invite those representatives to participate in the discussion, without the right to vote, under the provisions of Article 31 of the Charter and rule 37 of the provisional rules of procedure. 3. In view of the limited number of places available at the Council table, I invite those representatives to take the places reserved for them at the side of the Council chamber, on the understanding that they will be invited to take a place at the Council table whenever they wish to address the Council. At the invitation of the President, Mr. T. B. Sam (Ghana), Mr. F. M. Kasina (Kenya}, Mr. M El Hassen (Mauritania), Mr. S. A. Saline (United Republic of Tanzania) and Mr. Umba di Lutete (Zaire) took the places reserved for them at the side of the Council chamber.

I wish to inform the members of the Council that I have received a letter dated 23 March 1977 from the representatives of Benin, the Libyan Arab Republic and Mauritius, which has been distributed as document S/12304. It reads as follows: “We, the undersigned, members of the Security Council, have the honour to request that during its current meetings devoted to consideration of ‘The question of South Africa’, the Council extend an invitation, under rule 39 of its provisional rules of procedure, to Mr. William P. Thompson.” Is there any objection to the Council’s acceding to that request? 5. I caIl on the representative of the United Kingdom on a point of order.

I am not making any formal objection to this request, but I should like, if I may, merely to make a point which is relevant to our future conduct of work. 7. In this debate there have been a number of requests that the Council should listen to persons under rule 39 of 8. It would be extremely helpful to the Council in deciding whether or not to exercise the discretion which it has under rule 39 to hear persons who are neither representatives of Member States nor members of the Secretariat, if in the letter of request some indication could be given as to who the person in question is. 1 make IIO reflection at all on Mr. William P. Thompson except to say that his qualifications for rendering assistance to the Council do not actually appear in the letter which has been distributed. Unless we know whether or not Mr. Thompson can assist the Council, it seems a little strange that we should acquiesce quite so easily in allowing him to address the Council. 9. As I said, I make no objection to it formally. But it does seem to me that this is a point which the members of the Council, and particularly those members of the Council who make this sort of request under rule 39, might care to bear in mind in future. IO. The PRESIDENT: I take it that the Council agrees to the request that it extend an invitation under rule 39 to Mr. Thompson. It was so decided.

Mr. President, my delegation wishes to congratulate you most warmly on your assumption of the presidency of the Council for the month of March. As a fighter for civil rights in your own country, the United States of America, you have the necessary qualifications for a better understanding and a more objective perception of this great debate on the question of South Africa. 12. Before saying anything else, I should like to express the whole-hearted sympathy of my delegation to the friendly people of Romania, which has recently suffered the effects of a terrible earthquake. We are sure that the people of Romania, a heroic and revolutionary people, will be able to overcome the catastrophic consequences of that natural disaster. We also associate ourselves with the expressions of sympathy addressed to the people of Iran, which has been a victim of a similar catastrophe. 13. Benin, having itself recently been the victim of a cowardly act of aggression, is the more dismayed to see that the forces of evil, which have been working for the destabilization of the progressive regimes of the third world, are more and more determined to carry through their work of sabotage, The cowardly assassination of Comrade Marien Ngouabi of the People’s Republic of the Congo, another crime against the freedom of peoples, demonstrates that all peoples who love peace and justice must remain mobilized for a concerted and decisive struggle against all the forces of foreign domination. Through me, 14. Turning now to the subject before us, namely, the question of South Africa, my delegation would like to stress that this question is of the greatest concern to all African peoples and all the peoples of the world that love peace and justice. Apartheid, which is nothing but a colonial system of the most atrocious kind and the most inhumane ever imposed upon human beings, constitutes today not only a crime against mankind but also a potential danger to peace and security in the whole of Africa. 1.5. My delegation will not recount the history of npartheid. We have today objective and clear documentation on the system, thanks to the very careful and objective MDork done for many years now by the members of the Special Committee against Apartheid, by national organizations and by international bodies engaged in the struggle against apartlzeid In the light of that documentation, which is available and which everyone is free to peruse, it is easy to elucidate the following questions. 16. First, where does the white racist minority which at present dominates South Africa allegedly on behalf of Western Christian civilization come from and what does it represent? My delegation, still in the light of the aforementioned documentation, can answer that question only by saying that that white racist minority is of European origin and has never lacked encouragement in the elaboration of its system of domination and barbarous exploitation of the black man in South Africa. 17. Secondly, why is it that when everyone agrees to condemn apartkeid and is ready to proclaim aloud the need for its elimination, that system which is so inhumane is still such a fortified bastion and so protected today? My delegation would like to reply to this second question by saying publicly here that it is only fair to recognize that those shameless entities responsible for helping to strengthen that system are in fact Western Powers which, along with us, pay lip service to the condemnation of apartheid but do not take any decisive measures to eliminate it. On the contrary, independent Africa and the peoples of the whole world, concerned for the maintenance of international peace and security, are witness to the development and strengthening of relations of all kinds as well as of the close political co-operation which has long existed between the Western Powers and the white minority colonial regime of South Africa. Whether in the economic, military, political, scientific, nuclear, diplomatic, cultural or sports field, co-operation with the West has been raised to such a high level that the African peoples have good grounds for concern and for remaining distrustful. 18. Without going back over the details of that co-operation between the imperialist West and the Pretoria rt?gime, suffice it to note that, thanks to the Western Powers, that regime constitutes today-as so many speakers have already said-a military fortress used in the oppression and murder of the indigenous people of the country. From Sharpeville 19. Throughout each day we can hear the anti-African propaganda, disseminated to free Africa by the Pretoria radio, proclaiming that: “The Republic of South Africa is the most powerful and can intimidate and punish any recalcitrant African communist. The Republic of South Africa is there to defend Western civilization and fend off the communist danger.” That is the source of the famous policy of hot pursuit which has been behind so many acts of aggression and caused so much distress to many African countries in the combat zone. 20. My third question is: For whose purposes has the Pretoria rCgime determined, in spite of “pressure”, to pursue a policy of aggression and savage exploitation, a policy disavowed by all the peoples of the world? The reply to that question seems fundamental to us. In the light of everything we are able to observe it is clear that the Pretoria regime has a specific role to play in the imperialist strategy of domination and exploitation of Africa; for that regime controls a strategic route, the famous Cape route. As everyone knows, that route played a decisive role in the period of the so-called industrial revolution in Europe. It is well known that a good proportion of the wealth of third-world countries was drained out of the continent via that route to swell the treasuries of the countries which support apartheid. Furthermore, South Africa constitutes a vast reservoir of strategic ores which are of vital importance for the development of the Western machinery of provocation and aggression. 21. So no one should attempt to mislead us. The Pretoria rCgime is very definitely a preserve of international imperialism, it has always been our enemy, an enemy with which there can be no peace or compromise. For us Africans, at any rate, it is obvious that no dialogue is possible with South Africa. The only language which the Pretoria racists understand is the language of violence. 22. The Azanian people, a peace-loving people, have understood that language, which has been imposed upon them. By the revolt at Soweto and in other places in South Africa where blacks are herded like animals, the people of Azania have proved to the world their growing awareness, which is the ultimate weapon that will lead to the final and total elimination of that ill-famed rkgime. That, in fact, is what the colonialists are afraid of, for the awareness of the Azanian people is an invincible weapon. 23. The people of Benin, like all people who love peace and justice, WU do their utmost to support the people of Azania in their struggle to attain their self-determination

At present, the great African people are launching offensives against barbarous colonialism and racism. The Zimbabwe freedom fighters, who are rapidly expanding their ranks, have been launching ceaseless attacks against and dealing heavy blows at the Smith racist rCgime. The armed struggle of the Namibian people is developing in depth, whining continual new victories. Since the Soweto massacre last June, the heroic Azanian people have started a mammoth and earth-shaking mass struggle against violent repression, directing its spearhead against the criminal system of racial discrimination and apartheid. This is an important hallmark of the new awakening of the Azanian people since the Sharpeville carnage in 1960. The flames of the struggle spread swiftly from an area where Africans are concentrated to three of the four provinces of South Africa, and have reached Johannesburg, Cape Town and many other large and medium-sized cities, involving the broad masses of the people, from youths and students to workers and people from other walks of life. The struggIe has been unprecedented in its momentum and scale, in the areas affected and in its duration, The people have put forward clear-cut militant slogans. The crux of the matter lies in the question of system rather than of language; an end must be put to the system of apartheid in South Africa and black power must be attained. All this has intensified the Azanian people’s struggle against racism and for national liberation. 26. The emergence of the mounting struggle of the people of southern Africa against the racist regimes is the inevitable result of the brutal racial oppression and colonial domination practised by those rigimes over a long period. Racism and apartheid are the product of colonialism as well as its manifestation. In order to strengthen their colonialist domination over the Azanian people, the South A&can reactionary authorities, over the past half century, have issued countless decrees and regulations for racial discrimination, such as the racial segregation law, the public security law and so forth, subjecting the Africans to ruthless persecution in the political, economic, cultural and educational fields as well as in other aspects of social life. The South African reactionary authorities have confined 16 million black people to the arid native reserves which account for only 13 per cent of the total area of the country, whereas the remaining 87 per cent of fertile land is occupied by the 3 million or so whites. As the millions of black labourers, who suffer greatly from racist exploitation and oppression, are leading a life even worse than the beasts 27. To sustain its tottering reactionary rule, the Vorster racist regime is stepping up its counter-revolutionary dual tactics. Not long ago, after the repeated failure of its tactics of so-called “racial reconciliation”, “dialogue” and “detente”, it stage-managed in South Africa the farce of the sham independence of the Transkei, which is a kind of bantustan in disguised form, in an attempt to impose, in a legal form, the yoke of perpetual apartheid on the Azanian people and thus maintain its racist rule. Furthermore, in Namibia it is proceeding with its fraud of rigging up a puppet interim government, in an attempt to weaken the struggle of the Namibian people and to attain its aim of perpetuating its illegal occupation of Namibia. However, this farce and fraud has been exposed and sternly condemned by the African people and the people of the whole world. In these circumstances, the South African reactionary authorities, while continuing their political manoeuvres, have intensified their violent repression of the Azanian and Namibian peoples and their armed provocations against the neighbouring independent African countries, thereby demonstrating once again to people the world over that the nature of the racists will never change. 28. While the people of southern Africa are waging fierce struggles against the racist regimes, the two super-Powers are locked in intensified rivalry over it. One super-Power is trying, by every possible means, to preserve its enormous vested interests in southern Africa. The other super-Power, which parades itself as a natural ally of the African people, harbours even wilder ambitions. Flaunting the signboard of “opposing racism” and “supporting the national liberation movement”, it is bent on dividing the national liberation movements and undermining the militant unity of the African countries in an intensified effort to carry out infiltration and expansion in southern Africa and thus to establish its hegemony there. Recently, social-imperialism has mustered large numbers of mercenaries for a flagrant large-scale invasion of the Republic of Zaire. This is the latest example of its adamant hostility towards the African people as well as another glaring revelation of its unbridled hegemonic design in Africa. All this has enabled the people of southern Africa to realize ever more clearly that, in order to overthrow the colonial and racist domination and achieve genuine national Jiberation, it is imperative to link the struggles against colonialism and racism closely with those against hegemonism, to “prevent the tiger from entering through the back door while repulsing the wolf from the front gate” and do away with super-Power meddling and sabotage. 30. A heated debate on the question of apartheid went on for nearly two weeks during the thirty-first session of the General Assembly. The representatives of the numerous third-worId and all justice-upholding countries actively took the floor and indignantly condemned the South African racist rt$gime for its towering crimes, voicing powerful support for the struggle of the Azanian people against colonialism and racism and for national independence and liberation. The General Assembly, at its thirty-first session, not only adopted a correct resolution condemning the South African authorities for stage-managing the sham independence of the Transkei [resolution 3116 A], but also pointed out explicitly, in its resolution on the situation in South Africa, that the racist regime leaves “no alternative to the oppressed people of South Africa but to resort to armed struggle to achieve their legitimate rights” (resolution 31/6 I/. It is entirely proper for the General Assembly once again to request the Security Council to take urgent action to implement the arms embargo against South Africa [resolution 3116 D]. 31. The significant first Afro-Arab Summit Conference Meeting, held recently at Cairo, strongly condemned the racist regimes in southern Africa and voiced strong support for the just struggle of the people of southern Africa for national independence and liberation. The Conference vividly demonstrated the continual strengthening of the militant unity of the third-world countries and peoples in their struggles against imperialism, colonialism, racism, hegemonism and zionism. 32. The Chinese Government and people have always stood firmly by the great people of Azania, Namibia, Zimbabwe and the rest of Africa and resolutely supported their struggles against racism, imperialism and hegemonism. We firmly support the just demands of the African countries. We hold that the Security Council should adopt resolutions strongly condemning the crimes of the South African authorities, applying a mandatory arms embargo and economic sanctions against South Africa, enjoining the South African authorities to stop all repression and persecution of the Azanian people and calling upon all peoples and Governments to support and assist the people of Azania and the rest of southern Africa in their just struggles for independence and liberation. 33. As Chairman Mao Tsetung predicted, “the evil system of colonialism and imperialism arose and throve with the enslavement of Negroes and the trade in Negroes, and it will surely come to its end with the complete emancipation of the black people”. We are deeply convinced that the great people of Azania and the rest of Africa will further strengthen their unity, persevere in struggle, surmount all difficulties and hardships, clear away all obstacles on their road of advance and win greater victories. 36. / Since this is the first time I have spoken in the Security Council this year, I should like to welcome the new members of the Council: India, Mauritius, Venezuela, the Federal Republic of Germany and Canada. We hope that their membership will contribute to the success and effectiveness of the Council’s work. 37. On the other hand, it is my painful duty to express to our colleagues the representatives of Romania and Iran our feelings of deep sympathy in connexion with the tragic earthquakes that have struck their countries and caused great losses of life and property. 38. Three days ago, the international community solemnly observed the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, on the sad occasion of the seventeenth anniversary of the brutal massacre at Sharpeville perpetrated by the racist white minority regime of South Africa. The Sharpeville massacre was not, of course, the only or the last crime committed by the ugly racist South African regime. In fact, the whole history of that rdgime is nothing but a succession of crimes and massacres. Countless thousands of persons have been detained, tortured, injured and killed since Sharpeville; and only last June the racist regime carried out the same kind of massacre at Soweto. In its appeal issued last month on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Special Committee against Apartheid confirmed that at least 14 political detainees were known to have died at the hands of the security police since March 1976. 39. The overwhelming world condemnation of the aborninable crime of apartheid is most impressive, But what relief has this world-wide condemnation offered the suffering populations of Azania and Namibia? What good have the hundreds of resolutions, decisions, condemnations and statements of sympathy done the oppressed people of these usurped territories, when the very same big Powers that pretend to deplore and condemn apartheid are themsleves the closest collaborators with and the real protectors of the racist South African regime? 40. Today, the Security Council is once again considering the dangerous situation in South Africa. Will it be able this time to take the effective measures needed to put an end to that tragic situation-as it is its duty and responsibility to do in accordance with the Charter of the United Nationsor will it be content again with a watered-down resolution 41. Everyone knows today that it would have been completely impossible for the racist minority regimes in southern Africa to survive had it not been for the tacit support and encouragement accorded to those ugly regimes by certain Western Powers and by similar racist regimes, such as the Zionist regime. 42. The General Assembly adopted no fewer than 11 resolutions during its thirty-first session condemning the policies of apartheid of the Government of South Africa as well as the collaboration of certain countries with the South African regime in political, economic, military, cultural and scientific fields. The Zionist regime of Tel Aviv was considered by the Summit Conference of the nonaligned countries held at Colombo to be the northern end of the racist axis formed by the regimes of Israel, South Africa and Rhodesia. The Conference declared: “The racist regimes in Israel, South Africa and Rhodesia established by alien colonial settlers combine the ugly features of colonialism and racism as they all practise racism and subject the indigenous population to every form of discrimination, oppression, occupation and alien domination. These regimes form a racist axis aimed at the . . . domination of Africa and the Arab world.“1 43. The Zionist regime was the subject of a separate strong condemnation, in General Assembly resolution 31/6 E, for its ever-increasing collaboration with the racist regime of Pretoria. As a matter of fact, the collaboration between Israel and South Africa goes much further than the traditional co-operation between two imperialist racist r&imes, That is not surprising, because the similarity between Tel Aviv and Pretoria exceeds by far the common identity between two regimes practising colonialism in its classical form. There is undoubtedly no other entity besides South Africa, except Israel, which adopts the myth of racial or religious superiority as the basic law of the country. In Pretoria you are superior because you are white; in Tel Aviv you are superior, in addition, because you are Jewish. In South Africa they call themselves the ‘$chosen race”; in Israel they call themselves the “chosen people”. Both regimes practise oppression against the indigenous population and restrict the movement of that population to isolated ghettos and villages. Both regimes resort to settler colonialism as a means of usurping the land and uprooting the original inhabitants. 4.4. In his important statement before the first Afro-Arab Summit Conference Meeting, which was held at Cairo earlier this month, President Assad of the Syrian Arab Republic directed the attention of the African and Arab peoples to this common danger which is threatening Africa and the Arab region equally. President Assad pointed to the 1 A/31/197, annex I, para. 30. 45. The first Afro-Arab Summit Conference Meeting reaffirmed in its Political Declaration the riced to strengthen the united front of the African and Arab peoples in their struggle for national liberation, and condemned imperialism, colonialism, neo-colonialism, zionism, apartheid and all other forms of discrimination and racial and religious segregation, especially “under the forms in which they appear in southern Africa, Palestine and the other occupied Arab and African territories” [S/12298, annex, Para. 5/. In that Political Declaration, the Conference invited the Organization of African Unity and the League of Arab States “to exchange information regularly on the development of the common struggle for the liberation of their respective peoples in Africa and the Middle East to enable member States to play an effective and positive role in this respect” [ibid., para. 6/. The Conference decided, furthermore, that increased efforts should be made within OAU, the League of Arab States, the United Nations and all other international forums in order to find “the most effective ways and means of accentuating at the international level the political and economic isolas tion of Israel, South Africa and Rhodesia so long as the regimes of these countries persist in their racist, expansionist and aggressive policies” and, to this effect, the Conference affirmed “the necessity to continue to impose total boycott, political, diplomatic, cultural, sporting and economic, and in particular the oil embargo against these regimes” (ibid., para. 81. Finally, the Conference, fully convinced that the causes of Palestine, the Middle East, Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa are Afro-Arab causes, decided “to extend its total support to the peoples struggling against the racist and Zionist r&imes and to the front-line States bordering confrontation zones for their assistance to the national liberation struggle” [ibid., para. IO]. 46. The international community cannot permit the tragic situation in South Africa to go on for ever. It is no longer sufficient to adopt resolutions or issue condemnations. The racist regimes in southern Africa must be defeated and compelled to surrender power to the overwhelming majority of the indigenous population. Apartheid, which has plagued the African continent for more than three decades, 47. The Syrian Arab Republic remains committed to the struggle for the liberation of every inch of African territory with the same determination as shown in its commitment in the struggle for the liberation of every inch of the occupied Arab territories. The cause of freedom and peace is indivisible. If peace is a quarter of a century overdue in the Middle East, as President Carter said the other day, it is more than a quarter of a centmy overdue in Africa. As a matter of fact, the two tragedies of apat’rheid and Palestine began nearly at the same time. Apurtheid became the official policy of the white minority rigime in South Africa in 1948; that was the same year in which Palestine was dismembered and the latest chapter in the tragedy c$ the Palestinian people began. It is not only peace which is three decades overdue in Africa and the Middle East, it is also justice, because peace cannot be established without justice.

The next speaker is Mr. William P. Thompson, to whom the Council has agreed to extend an invitation under rule 39 of its provisional rules of procedure. I invite him to take a place at the Council table and to make his statement. 49. Mr. THOMPSON: Mr. President, I should like to begin by expressing to you personally the congratulations and good wishes of your former colleagues within the ecumenical molement. 50. I regret, as I know you do, that Mr. Philip Potter, General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, was unable to accept your invitation to appear and address himself to the situation in South Africa from the perspective of the ecumenical movement. I am pleased that I have been able to accept your invitation to appear in his stead. On behalf of the Christian Churches of the world, I express appreciation for your invitation to take part in this discussion. 51. I am a member of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches. That Council is a world fellowship of 289 Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox Churches throughout the world, involving approximately 400 million Christians, I am President of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, an international body of Presbyterian and Congregational Churches. The World Alliance has a membership of 143 Churches in 85 countries with a membership of more than 55 million. The National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, of which I am also President, has 30 Orthodox and Protestant member Churches with a total constituency of about 42 million. I am also the Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America. I hasten to add that I do not presume to speak for the member Churches of these ecumenical bodies, much less for their individual communicant members. I appear today as an individual. 52. I was trained as a lawyer and practised that profession for 20 years before being elected to the office I now hold in 53. The system of apartheid as practised in South Africa is an affront to the religious, moral and ethical convictions of the Churches, the United Nations and the world. Apartheid as a system has economic, political, social and cultural ramifications, expressed in a multitude of discriminatory laws and practices. However, it involves a more basic issue because it violates the meaning of creation, the very nature and destiny of all humanity. Apartheid embodies a pattern of injustice and oppression imposed on a people solely because of their race. It involves a denial of the inherent claims of all people to dignity, equality and freedom. It borders on the denial of even the right to life itself. In a religious sense it involves the breaking of the fellowship of those who believe in God as the creator of all people. 54. The concerns of the United Nations are prescribed in Article 1 of its Charter, which speaks of “the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples” and of “respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language, or religion” and in the principles enunciated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which in article 1 proclaims that “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights”. 55. The practical issues include, first, how to achieve justice and make possible liberation from a system which oppresses peoples and denies basic rights and, secondly, how to avoid world-wide conflict because of a threat to peace in this particular situation. 56. The focus of concern is upon two systems, The first is the evil system of apartkeid which exists in South Africa. The second, without which the first could not survive, is that international system which supports and enables the South African Government to continue policies in gross violation of the Charter and the Declaration. That international system undergirds the military and police structures of South Africa through the sale and transfer of technology and military hardware used in and required for the support of a totalitarian system. It strengthens the economic structure through the continued operation of transnational corporations in South Africa and the continued flow of investments and loans which make the apartheid system profitable. 57. I understand that the draft resolutions under consideration by the Council concern the second system. While I cannot speak on the specific draft resolutions, it is my privilege to share with the Council somelhing of the attitudes held by the Churches in this matter. 58. For more than five decades, the Churches of the ecumenical movement have been expressing their deep concern about racism. This is not to deny that, in many parts of the world, Churches themselves have been guilty of 59. I was present at the fourth Assembly of the World Council of Churches which met in 1968 at Uppsala, Sweden. That Assembly urged the World Council to embark on a vigorous campaign against racism and “to undertake a crash programme to guide the Council and the member Churches in the urgent matter of racism”. By that time, the membership of the World Council of Churches had become much more representative of world Christian opinion and the burning issues of the third world began to receive priority on its agenda. The Uppsala Assembly met in the shadow of the death of Martin Luther King, Jr., who originally was scheduled to be the guest preacher at the opening worship service. In that atmosphere, the Assembly was challenged to move beyond words to action. The result was the launching, in collaboration with member Churches, of the World Council’s Programme to Combat Racism, to express solidarity with the racialiy oppressed. I participated in the 1969 Central Committee meeting of the World Council, which singled out white racism as the most dangeroll., form of the present racial conflict. It was only natural that South Africa should have received special attention. That Central Committee, meeting at-Canterbury, approved the details of the Programme. 60. Mr. President, I know that you are personally a& quainted with the details of the Programme from your own participation in shaping it and implementing it. 61. The Programme and other agencies of the World Council, such as the Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, have attempted to interpret the struggle for liberation in South Africa from the perspective of the oppressed people. The World Council of Churches has given financial aid to the liberation movements of South Africa for humanitarian programmes, primarily in health and education. That financial support has however been minimal. The moral support has doubtless been more significant, The educational impact, both within and outside the Churches, has been considerable. For more than a decade, the World Council has also carried out a programme of assistance to victims of oppression in South Africa as well as to those who have become refugees because of their struggle against injustice. 62. In 1972, I participated in the meeting of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches at Utrecht, which adopted two resolutions. The first stated that the World Council itself should withdraw its funds from corporations which were involved in investment and trade in South Africa. The second urged member Churches, Christian agencies and individual Christians to use their influence to press corporations to withdraw investments from and cease trading with South Africa. Those actions have also been of symbolic and educational value. 63. I also participated in the World Council Central Committee meeting at Geneva in 1976. At that meeting the Committee reiterated its support of the struggle for justice 64. The actions of the National Council of the Churches 0f Christ in the United States of America have been similar. In 1963, speaking about the meaning of human rights, the Counc~ stated that “denials of rights and freedoms that inhere in man’s worth before God are not simply a crime against humanity, they are a sin against God”. That same statement drew attention to the failure of the world community to translate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights into effective action. It also pointed specifically to “the denials of racial equality , . . in the Republic of South Africa”, It called for “renewed dedication of our citizens and our Government to the manifold concerns for human rights . . . in the growing world community and thus to larger measures of justice and freedom making for more peace on earth”. 65. In 1975, the National Council of the Churches of Christ specifically condemned “the South African Government for continuing its racist apartheid practices in the face of almost unanimous international opposition, for its repressive acts of torture, imprisonment and detention without trial, for denying the black majority their right to vote or own land and for their illegal occupation of Namibia”. It also condemned “the policies of the United States and other Western countries which assist the white minority Governments of southern Africa”. 66. Those statements have been supported by actions in a number of ways, not only by the National Council of Churches but also by separate denominations, Those actions include support for the World Council’s Programme to Combat Racism and the development of methods of influencing United States-based corporations through stock. holder activity. This work is now coordinated by the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility, an agency supported by 14 Protestant groups and 150 Roman Catholic orders. The Churches have also been engaged in educational activity within the United States, They have sought, in various ways, to maintain communication and fellowship with religious groups in South Africa, giving support and encouragement in their struggle for justice. 67. Concerning the military situation, it is my belief that the continued flow of arms, matt!rieZ and military technology, through sales or transfer to South Africa from whatever source, serves to maintain the capability of the South African Government-which represents a minorityto oppress and control the majority of its citizens, We have witnessed and have been appalled by the increasing level of violence which that Government is willing to employ to prevent change in the apartheid system and to perpetuate 68. The economic situation in South Africa exploits the labour of the oppressed people. It utilizes the natural resources, which should be the common heritage of all the country’s citizens, for the benefit of the privileged few. The continued supportive practices of rnany countries, especially the industrialized nations, help to perpetuate the apartheid system. I have become convinced that, to respond to such economic support, economic measures are a permissible and necessary form of international action. I believe that the call for an end to new investments and new loans, public or private, is more and more urgent, and that the time has come to call upon transnational corporations to close shop in South Africa and withdraw from their involvement there as soon as possible. Already six United States denominations and two Roman Catholic orders have filed stockholder resolutions with United States-based corporations, calling for such withdrawal. A growing number of Christians now believe that the time has come for the international community to boycott South Africa economically, 69. Two weeks ago, as part of a continuing dialogue with Churches in southern Africa, a group of Church leaders met at Marty, New York, That consultation included more than 20 persons from southern Africa, together with others from Europe and the United States, The message of that consultation contains the following statement that summarizes the position of many Churches throughout the world: “Our special concern is the liberation from oppression and the development of the people in the nations of southern Africa and the realization of the full potential of persons. Our gathering is not in support of any Government; it is religious, because we work for justice, and we do so in the understanding that the entirety of human life is of concern to God. Hence, the Christian community must confront any forces that deny human dignity, equality, freedom or life itself. Most especially we affirm our conviction that institutions, political or otherwise, which deny human worth on the basis of race are evil.”

The next speaker is the represen tative of Madagascar, I invite him to take a place at the Council table and to make his statement.

Since my Ambassador has been called abroad on mission, it is 1 who have the honour to 72. For three decades now our Organization has been dealing with the question of apartheid in South Africa, three decades at the end of which we have to note with regret that the problem remains unsolved, not to say more complicated and even more threatening owing to its implications, on the one hand, for the life of the oppressed masses and, on the other, for international peace and security. 73. The justice that we claim for the victims ofapu?%&+d, the respect for their dignity as men and the recognition of their rights-these are the objectives that continue to elude us, despite the concerted efforts of the victims, of the liberation movements which protect and help them and of the Governments or international organizations which are concerned with this question. 74. Speaking after so many others who have described in moving terms the sombre situation in which the non-white majority of South Africa lives, I may perhaps refrain from recalling well-known facts and confine myself to state briefly my Government’s assessment of the evolution of the question which we are now debating. 75. We see, first of all, that despite the extortions of the oppressing Power, the political consciousness-raising of the vast majority of the South African population continues and is being more clearly reaffirmed, to the point that the racist minority regime can no longer claim to ignore the fact that its legitimacy and its reprehensible acts are being questioned by the whole world. We see that, despite many prohibitions and arbitrary decisions, despite the acts of violence and intimidation of all kinds, the nationalism of the African majority is growing in intensity. That nationalism is becoming organized and its adherents renounce neither their aspirations to freedom and justice nor their legitimate ambitions to accede one day to power and preside over the fate of an independent Azania, sovereign and free from the shackles of apartheid. And even though some people might describe all this as an impossible dream, those of us who have experienced the same forms of persecution, alienation and exploitation have no difficulty in understanding and espousing those objectives. 76. We observe further the horrifying reactions of the de facto authorities of Pretoria in the fact of that nationalist awakening which is causing cracks that defy repair to appear in the political foundations of the regime and, at the same time, frustrating the efforts the r&me is making to acquire a measure of respectability and acceptance in the community of nations. 7’7. The psychosis to which the racist minority of southern Africa has fallen prey has for us a very simple name. It is a 78. There is a very strange kind of psychology which consists in boosting one’s sense of personal power by sowing death, desolation and hatred among the population whose labour and goodwill are necessary for one’s own economic well-being. It is a very peculiar psychology, that of the 4 million racists, who are condemned by the rest of mankind and yet remain determined to perpetuate by force of arms a strange and grotesque world of their own choosing. 1-10~ can one explain, indeed, that there are two firearms for each white citizen in South Africa’? How can one explain the increase in the military budget of that country which, in 20 years, went from 41.5 million rand to 1.5 billion rand? 79. The inevitable triumph of the just cause of the majority justifies our describing the reaction of South Africa as futile and irrational, However, it is dangerous too, because ;t takes the form of a crude and arrogant desire for dominalion come what may. This coincides with the observations of the author of an article which appeared in the review Foreign Affairi in October 1976, in which we read that, compeIled to choose between dominating, dealing with the majority or dying, the South African racists chose domination, without any concessions what. soever to the majority population. 80. The liberation movements-the African National Congress, the Pan Africanist Congress and the South West Africa People’s Organization-were not mistaken about the nature of that decision. Neither do they believe in negotiation, for they do not believe that the liberation of the oppressed masses will be brought about by a hypothetical act of sudden contrition or generosity inasmuch as men do not gratuitously renounce their privileges unless they are budding saints, which certainly cannot be said of the Vorster clique. 81. This leads me to the third fact we have noted, that is, the total breakdown in communications between the opposing groups in South Africa, which only engage in violent exchanges during their periodic confrontations. Is it possible to change this situation? Only the future will tell, but pessimism does not seem out of place here. 82. We have come before the Security Council, like many other Governments, aware that if there are to be changes in South Africa some external factor will be needed to act as a catalyst. We are convinced that the United Nations, acting through the Council, is in the best position to play this part. The international situation today seems to favour decisive action by the Organization, whose moral authority has so far not been fully exercised owing to certain differences of opinion not only with regard to the interpretation of certain clauses of the Charter but also concerning the nature of the changes which must be brought about in South Africa, X4. It would bc superfluous at this stage to refer again to the serious breaches of the spirit and the letter of the Charter, to the innumerable contraventions of the purposes and principles of the United Nations or to the challenges to its authority of which the Pretoria rdgime is guilty. We have before us a case in which the legal arguments in favour of the application of Articles 5, 6, 41 and 42 of the Charter are consistent with the facts. we have before us a situation in which it is no longer possible to disregard those provisions of the Charter, whose application, however delicate or difficult it may be, must be absolute and can by no means be suspended indefinitely, because that would be to invite the de facto authorities of Pretoria to give further proof of their intransigence and arrogance. The worst thing that the Council could do would be not to act. 85. To make the deeper meaning of what we advocate quite plain, I should like to say that we are not concerned with punitive measures, even though the crimes committed against the lives, the physical well-being, the freedom and the dignity of South African citizens call for redress and compensation. In this respect, we know that the blood of the martyrs has not been shed in vain, We also know that those who sow the wind of oppression will reap the whirlwind of the liberating revolution. What concerns us at this stage is the adoption by the Council of all the measures proposed by the African countries and their friends on the basis of General Assembly resolutions. Those measures are within the limits authorized by the Charter and cannot be described as excessive. But their adoption would mean that the international community was now united in its desire to translate into action the support it gives the liberation movements. It would mean that, under the leadership of the Council, Member States had decided to undo the obstinate resistance of the forces which have not yet given up on the idea of perpetuating white supremacy in Africa. The adoption of those measures would mean that we had finally resolved, as it were, to “destabilize” that illegal Power by depriving it of its economic, military and even political support. 86. Speaking on the same subject at the thirty-first session of the General Assembly,2 my Ambassador in particular

The next speaker is the representative of Botswana. I invite him to take a place at the Council table and to make his statement.

Mr. President, allow me to extend to you my very warm congratulations and those of my delegation on your assumption of the presidency of the Security Council for this month. From your performance since this debate began, we have already received assurance of your qualities as an able helmsman. You bring with you, as several who spoke before me have stated, vast experience as a committed activist in the field of human rights in your own country, an experience which should indeed be useful as you now grapple with the issue before the Council. One notes with interest the fact that, before you assumed your duties at the United Nations, you visited Africa to familiarize yourself with the vital issues at stake. We are confident, therefore, that you will pilot this debate to a fruitful conclusion and we wish you well. 89. The question of which the Council is seized todaythat of apartheid-is a very old and grave one indeed. If we are talking about a political system in which racial bigotry, racial discrimination and fallacious doctrines of racial superiority are the basis on which society in South Africa is organized, if we are speaking about a society in which a handful of whites dominate and intend to dominate in perpetuity the overwhelming black majority on no other basis than that of race, then we are talking about a political system which is over three centuries old, a political system which dates back to the coming of Europeans to South Africa in 16.52. 90. Whether South Africa was under British colonial rule, which it was in fact until the formation of the Union of South Africa in 1910, or whether it was under the Afrikaners, which has for all intents and purposes been the case since 191 O-for since that date all South African Prime Ministers have invariably been Afrikaners who, over the years, consciously fashioned a racialist political system that came to be called apartheid in 1948, when racialism was formally institutionalized as the basis for the organization of South African society-racialism is certainly the basis on which society has always been and still is organized in South Africa. 91. Apartheid, the latest and most viciously oppressive Phase of that racialist political system, was indeed institutionafized and implemented only in 1948. Thenceforth, the 92. When the leaders of the npartheid State openly and frankly State that they have never contemplated, do not do SO 110~ and will not in the near future contemplate dismantling apartheid, whell they boldly and arrogantly assert that they are ready to defend apartheid eve11 if they have to stand alone in the world, then we must take them seriously, for they are articulating dangerous feelings and prejudices deeply embedded in history. 93. In the 183Os, the forefathers of the present leaders left what was then called the Cape Colony, to colonize the interior of South Africa, depriving Africans of their land. That is how 87 per cent of the land came to be white-owned and 13 per cent came to be black, They left the Cape because, as they claimed, British liberalism as they .saw it, threatened to give a minimum of civil rights to the African-not that it did in fact make any significant change. In their own words, the Afrikaners left the Cape in order to establish states in the interior where they would maintain “proper relations between black and white”. Indeed, the Constitution of the Transvaal, the first viable Afrikaner State in the interior, clearly stated that there would bc “no equality in Church or State between black and white in the Transvaal”. This was in the early 185Os, and the spirit of that Constitution is the spirit of the present South African Constitution. The spirit of that early State of the 1850s is the spirit of the present apartheid State, and that spirit is apartheid. It was in defence of that kind or political system that the Afrikaners fought many wars against the British who, of course, at that time fought not so much for human rights as for control of the vast gold deposits in the Johannesburg area. 94, It should be noted that the Constitution of the Union of South Africa negotiated between the British, as the colonial Power, and the Afrikaners opened the way for the rise of a virulently exclusivist Afrikaner nationalism that was to triumph in 1948. The opportunity to thwart the rise of that phenomenon was lost at that very moment, especially because the colonial Power was negotiating with a people that had just been defeated in the Boer war of 1899-1902. Writing about this tragic episode in South African history, a white South African historian observed that the whites of South Africa compromised and collaborated at the expense of the Africans. Nothing that has happened so far would belie that very observant thesis. That has been a consistent theme ever since 1910. 9.5. Let us today, during this last quarter of the tWentk!th century, during this decade when the United Nations is committed to eradicating all forms of racial discrimination, ensure that our decisions regarding the elimination of apartheid will be so effective that future historians will not accuse us of collaborating with the apartheid State. So far, the voting pattern of some Members of the United Nations, both in the General Assembly and in the Security Council, would regrettably lay them open to such charges. 97. The leaders of South Africa have so far shown themselves to be indifferent to international pleas and admonitions to abandon apartheid and build a free society of equals in South Africa. What this means, then, is that this cancer in the body politic of South Africa calls for major surgery if the chaos which its continued existence is bound to bring about is to be avoided, There are those, both in the Security Council and outside it, who have the power and influence to coerce Pretoria into abandoning its mad course. Let those nations which after all have, at least theoretically in this case, expressed humanitarian concerns help to defuse this highly charged, volatile sifuation. 98. In dealing with South Africa, we must not see illusions or mirages; we must not be deceived by cosmetic changes which the regime is now trying to sell to the world. We are told that in South Africa itself petty apartheid is on the way out, that blacks can now use parks hitherto reserved for whites, that certain careMy selected hotels are open to blacks, that multiracial sport is on the way, that politically the Africans can exercise their right to self-determination in the bantustans. We are told that, in Namibia, the Turnhalle talks will bring about independence soon-and SO forth,ad injinitW72. 99. All these are mere smoke-screens, and dangerous ones at that, since those who usually see mirages when they deal with South Africa may see these as the beginnings of positive change-dangerous, I say, because they can only weaken international solidarity against South Africa. These are mere stratagems employed by the regime to buy time. The only acceptable change is a political one that will eliminate apartheid and give genuine political right{ to all the people of South Africa regardless of race, colour or creed. 100. We are constantly, told that peaceful change is the acceptable method to bring about desired change in South Africa. This is nothing new to the Africans generally and to the South African blacks in particular. In fact, to all mankind, peaceful resolution of disputes is always preferable to war, The South African blacks need no sermons on this because theirs has been one of the longest peaceful struggles in the history of African nationalist protest on the entire continent of Africa. On the other hand, the apartheid State has always resorted to violence to silence legitimate peaceful protest. It is for that reason that the path of the 102. The Organization of African Unity for its part has always preferred peaceful solutions to war, hence the Lusaka Manifesto,3 which South Africa in its characteristic fashion has disdainfully ignored. South Africa, by its intransigence and violence, is forcing the people to resort to violence. The President of the Republic of Rotswana, Sir Seretse Khama, succinctly put this point across when he addressed the American Council of Foreign Relations in New York in 1976. He told his audience: “I am confident, however, that you will agree that the days of peaceful change in southern Africa are almost over”, and went on to say that violence was inevitable, “primarily because those who still hold the people of southern Africa in subjugation have chosen the path of war rather than the path of peace”. He said, furthermore, that Africans agreed in principle with those who decried violence as an instrument of change, but that the Africans did not “agree with those who refuse to see why it is that in southern Africa the freedom fighters have resorted to violence as an instrument of change”. 103. If the minority rigimes in southern Africa abandon their disastrous courses and opt for meaningful negotiations aimed at the transfer of power to the majority, the liberation movements will surely be ready and willing, as always, to talk, for they have nothing to fear. The alternative to this is a racial war which we in Africa have spared no effort to prevent, a war whose consequences can can only be very ghastly, not only for Africa but for the entire world. Your own President, Sir, recently warned of the gathering racial conflict that threatens all of southern Africa. 104. We live in that part of Africa, a part of our great continent with great potential for growth and development endowed as it is with vast mineral resources, rich agricultural lands, rivers and seas which teem with fish, hydroelectric potential and a population of about 50 million which would provide a viable market for its manufactured goods. But the full utilization of that potential is impossible SO long as the minority dgimes, whose kingpin or nerve centre is South Africa, continue to exist. 3 fiid., Twenty-fourth Session, Annexes, agenda iteln 106, dacumerit A/7154. 106. South Africa itself boasts of a flourishing munitions industry and reports indicate that it may soon acquire nuclear weapons. The apartheid regime is heavily militarizing the international Territory of Namibia, disregarding the decisions of the International Court of Justice, which carry the force of international law. The regime has now amended its Defence Law so that, when it feels threatened, its armed forces can strike anywhere up to the equator. The apartheid leaders at Pretoria make no secret of the fact that their defensible borders extend far beyond South Africa. Indeed the attacks against Angola and Zambia attest to this. 107. Within South Africa itself, oppression is the order of the day as more Draconian legislation is passed and the police and army treat the African people with utter disregard for human life. 108. The Security Council should now act unanimously and resolutely in arriving at the solution to this problem. The solution should match the gravity of the situation, bearing in mind also the fact that hitherto South Africa has ignored all the resolutions of both the General Assembly and the Security Council. The Charter of the United Nations provides for peaceful but resolute solutions. The credibility of the United Nations provides for peaceful but resolute solutions. The credibility of the Council is at stake unless we emerge from this debate with positive decisions, which will help us to solve the problem of apartheid 109. South Africa cannot stand alone in this world, its pronouncements to the contrary notwithstanding. So far, the regime has disregarded United Nations decisions in the full knowledge that it could count on the support of certain Western members of the Security Council. During the thirty-first session of the General Assembly, the Minister for External Affairs of Botswana called upon the Western Powers “not to sacrifice the indigenous people of Africa on the altar of mercantile and mercenary intests”. We repeat that call today. The meeting rose at 12.50 ps m. 4 Ibid., Thirty-Jrst Session, Plenary Meetings, 21th meeting, para. 44. HOW TO OBTAIN UNITED NATIONS PUBLICATIONS United Nations publications may be obtained from bookstores and distributors throughout the world. Consult your bookstore or write to: United Nations, Sales Section, New York or Geneva. COMMENT SE PROCURER LES PUBLICATIONS DES NATIONS UNIES Les publications des Nations Unies sont en vente dans les librairias et les agences d6positaires du monde entier. Informez-vous aupres de votre libraire ou adressez-vous B : Nations Unies. Section des ventes, New York ou Geneve. ICAK IIOllY’IHTh R3A.4HHJ-f OPrAHtI 3AqliH OJKbEAHHEHHhIX HAUZIR EInm.~wrr Opranu3aquu Ob%e~unennbrx Haunfi htoxoio tcynn~b B ~rnixtnbIx Mara- JHHaX N areHTCTs.aX BO BC~X paRoHaX Mupa. HasoAwTe cnpaaKu 06 W3RaHWsX a BarneM ~A)I(HOM M~X~HH~ URN ~H~HTS no aflpecy: Opranu3aqns 06-be~uuemibrx HasuB, CeKnuR no npoflaxe wafis,w~R, Hbro-Ffopx H,-IH XeHeea. COMO CONSEGUIR PUBLICACIONES DE LAS NACIONES UNIDAS Las publicaciones de las Naciones Unidas estin en venta en librerias y casas distribuidoras en todas partes de1 mundo. Consutte a su librero o dirijase a: Naciones Unidas, Seccicn de Ventas, Nueva York o Ginebra. Lltho in United Nations, New York’ Price: $U.S. 1.00 (or equivalent in other currencies) 70001-December 1977-2,200