Free Republic

Hundreds of thousands of whites left South Africa following the ANC's landslide election victory in 1994. Twenty years on, the exodus shows signs of slowing, even reversing. Jane Flanagan spoke to some of those who have returned. Nicky and Craig Irving spent five years in Australia before moving back to Cape Town with their three daughters. They were among the last members of their respective families to emigrate amid fears over the crime wave that swept South Africa during the 1990s. "The challenge to us from our relatives who had left was 'How can you raise your children in a...

Israel-bashing figures prominently in 'teach-ins' where San Franciscans seek a flavor of the Vietnam era Let's admit it - San Francisco is gorgeous, and deserves its name as the capital of resistance to what the US is trying to do in the Middle East. After all, while other places from coast to coast had rallies and marches before and during Operation Iraqi Freedom, only there were thousands "hauled off by the pigs" for blocking the financial district, and only there was there a rally and march almost every Saturday for weeks and weeks until Saturday, April 19. But were all...

Retired archbishop Desmond Tutu has said he is happy Nelson Mandela is dead—so he does not have to see what South Africa’s current leaders are doing to the country. Since Jacob Zuma became president, Tutu has become increasingly critical of the African National Congress (ANC), which has held power in South Africa since the end of apartheid in 1994—first under the leadership of Mandela. “I didn’t think there would be a disillusionment so soon,” he told South Africa’s Sunday Times, before adding: “I’m glad that Madiba is dead. I’m glad that most of these people are no longer alive to...

Under apartheid inter-racial relationships were banned in South Africa. Journalist Mpho Lakaje, who is married to a white woman, reflects on how the country has changed in the 20 years since the end of white minority rule. When I started dating the woman I was to marry many of my friends and some of her family - black and white - were united in opposition.

Six months pregnant, Elizabeth Kganyo was determined to cast her vote, even if it meant standing in a sun-baked queue for hours on end. "I was so excited because it was the first time," she recalls, sitting on an upturned plastic basket outside her shack in Diepsloot, north of Johannesburg. "Everybody wanted to vote. Everybody was happy." South Africa held its first multiracial election 20 years ago on Sunday, defying bombs, bluster and the threat of civil war to conjure a spectacle of voters in long, winding lines that ravished the world. But for Kganyo, like millions of others who...

The multi-coloured flag of modern South Africa is a symbol of its post-apartheid rebirth. But while Nelson Mandela led the country on a "long walk" to freedom, the creation of the flag 20 years ago was a frantic sprint by an unsung hero, writes Xin Fan. On a Saturday night at the end of February 1994 Fred Brownell's phone rang. The voice on the other end asked him to get a new national flag designed - within a week. "It scared the living daylights out of me," says Brownell, now 74 and living in retirement in Pretoria. Brownell was state...

South Africa on Sunday celebrates the 20th anniversary of its first ever all-race, democratic election that ended decades of sanctioned racial oppression under the apartheid system. The day will be marked by street parades, speeches, prayers, music and military salutes and displays. President Jacob Zuma leads the main festivities at the Union Buildings, the seat of government in Pretoria, where generations of apartheid leaders penned many of the racial laws that South Africa’s first black leader Nelson Mandela fought most of his life. After the historic April 27, 1994, the day has been retained as a holiday and named Freedom...

Many believe the world is run by a secret organization like the Illuminati, and the people we think are in power are nothing but stooges. It sounds implausible, but is it really a crazy idea? Yes. Yes, it is. And yet there have been secret organizations that created the world as we know it. 10The Carbonari After Napoleon’s defeat in 1814, the European powers had to decide what to do with the territory that he’d ruled as part of the First French Empire. The borders of Europe were redrawn at the Congress of Vienna, mainly decided by Great Britain, Russia,...

© ITAR-TASS/Valery Matitzyn MOSCOW, April 23. /ITAR-TASS/. Crimea’s authorities have already raised a sum of $1.5 billion on the construction of a gambling zone on the peninsula, Crimea’s First Deputy Prime Minister Rustam Temirgaliyev said in an interview with the Izvestia newspaper published on Wednesday. Bearing in mind the fact that the world’s biggest gambling companies have already officially promised to invest in this project, budgetary financing will be minimal, he noted. “It is planned to create at least 10,000 new jobs. The resort is expected to yield a large-scale multiplier effect - a high workload of the entire infrastructure:...

...The four hominin individuals died when they fell into a "death trap" in a cave about 2 million years ago at Malapa, South Africa, according to new dates reported by Berger... In addition to the articulated partial skeletons of a youth and an older female unveiled last year in Science, the team members reported the discovery of bones of an 18-month-old infant and at least one other adult. This means they are getting a good look at Au. sediba's development from infancy to old age... Berger and members of his team sketched a quick portrait of Au. sediba, who lived...

Platinum and palladium prices are dropping sharply on signs that South African mining companies are close to reaching a labor agreement that would end a four-month strike. Platinum fell $28, or 2 percent, to close at $1,400.70 an ounce. Palladium lost $29.30, or 3.6 percent, to $777.80 an ounce. …

Desmond Tutu is a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end apartheid in South Africa, and has long been a supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which uses nonviolent means to challenge the Israeli occupation of Palestine and is the initiative being attacked by these bills. Tutu notes that these legislative initiatives are aimed “at punishing and intimidating those who speak their conscience and challenge the human rights violations endured by the Palestinian people.”

The group of five major emerging national economies known as the BRICS has rejected the Western sanctions against Russia and the “hostile language” being directed at the country over the crisis in Ukraine. “The escalation of hostile language, sanctions and counter-sanctions, and force does not contribute to a sustainable and peaceful solution, according to international law, including the principles and purposes of the United Nations Charter,” foreign ministers of the BRICS countries - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - said in a statement issued on Monday.

Brazil is fighting against time to avoid crippling power blackouts and electricity rationing as a drought prevents the world's most water-rich nation from recharging its hydroelectric dams. A decade of growth has diversified the electricity system away from hydropower, but policymakers, industrial companies and investors in the world's seventh-largest economy may find little cause to relax.

The G7 club of wealthy nations has canceled a summit with Russia over its annexation of Crimea, but emerging economies have protested against its exclusion from a G20 meeting. […] For its part, US ally Australia had indicated Russia might also be excluded from a G20 summit in Brisbane in November. But Brazil, China, India, and South Africa rejected the idea. They said, together with Russia, also at The Hague, where almost 60 countries had sent VIPs to a Nuclear Security Summit, that “the escalation of hostile language, sanctions and counter-sanctions … does not contribute to a sustainable and peaceful...

STATE DEPARTMENT — With Russia's most vocal critics imposing economic sanctions over Crimea, some of Moscow's allies are also questioning its actions in Ukraine. In Syria's civil war, China and Russia have together blocked tougher action against President Bashar al-Assad, denouncing foreign support for the rebels as a breach of Syrian sovereignty. Now, China has quietly split from Russia over Crimea -- on the same issue of sovereignty. "China always respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all states. The Crimean crisis should be resolved politically under the frameworks of law and order. We call on all sides to remain...

 An Islamic organisation has voiced its disgust on Friday after a 10 year-old-boy was assaulted and molested at mosque in Lenasia.Earlier reports said the boy was assaulted at a church, but according to Jamiatul Ulama South Africa the incident happened at a mosque in Lenasia’s Extension 11. Jamiatul Ulama South Africa general secretary Moulana E I Bham said the victim was molested by three teenagers and a 23-year-old man, who have since been arrested. “We would like to strongly denounce this incident and welcome the quick arrests which have so far been made of the suspects.” Police spokesperson Kay Makhubela...

South Africa imposed rolling power cuts for the first time since 2008 on Thursday as it struggled to cope with coal shortages and technical problems caused by recent heavy rains. State-owned electricity firm Eskom said incessant downpours over the past week had flooded mines and left stockpiles too wet to use in its coal-fired power plants. . . . . . . . . . "We do not believe we have a crisis in energy at this present time," said Water Minister Edna Molewa.

Former Congressman Mel Reynolds breaks his silence after being deported from Zimbabwe. He says he’s now in hiding. Eyewitness News reached the former Congressman by phone in South Africa. That’s where he says he has been in “hiding” since his flight out of Zimbabwe a little more than a week ago. Mel Reynolds spent 2 years and 10 months in Congress. Last month, he was in a Zimbabwean jail for six days. […] Reynolds says he will begin publicly revealing information he claims to have about people illegally doing business with the Mugabe regime at a press conference in South...

SNIPPET: "Former Guantanamo Bay detainee Moazzam Begg is among four people who have been arrested on suspicion of Syria-related terrorism offences, police have said. Mr Begg, 45, who was held by the US authorities for almost three years, was arrested earlier with two other men and a woman in the West Midlands. He was detained on suspicion of attending a terrorist training camp and facilitating terrorism overseas." SNIPPET: "Mr Begg was arrested in Hall Green in Birmingham. The other people arrested - a 36-year-old man from Shirley, a 44-year-old woman and her son, 20, both from Sparkhill - are being...