FOREIGN Minister Pik Botha left today for a UN Security Council
meeting on South Africa, saying he hoped for pressure on the African
National Congress to resume talks with the Government.
''The next step as I see it is that the world will tell South
Africans: 'Look, you'd better get back to the negotiating table.' If
this is the price we must pay -- to go to New York -- then it's worth
it,'' Botha told reporters.
He said South Africans had to solve their problems by themselves, but
added that there were no objections to international organisations
helping to get the talks on track again.
African countries at the United Nations sought Wednesday's meeting in
collaboration with the ANC, whose leader Nelson Mandela will also
address it.
Botha said he hoped the meeting, expected to focus on township
violence which has killed 6000 blacks in two years, would result in ''an
even-handed resolution urging all the parties to accept joint
responsibility''.
The ANC broke off negotiations on a non-racial constitution last month
after 42 blacks were killed in the Boipatong massacre, accusing the
Government of responsibility for the violence.
Meanwhile, Professor Ibrahim Agboola Gambari, chairman of the UN
Special Committee against Apartheid, urged the international community
to encourage the resumption of the democracy talks.
He is in Britain to address the forthcoming International Hearing in
London on violence in South Africa.
Gambari, who will attend the Security Council meeting, said the
Boipatong massacre was more than so-called black-on-black violence. He
claimed the South African Government was directly responsible for it.
* The bodies of two policemen who had been hacked and stoned to death
were found today, taking the weekend toll in South Africa's black
townships to at least nine.--Reuter.
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