Leaders | South Africa’s foreign policy

Clueless and immoral

A country that symbolises human rights and freedom is turning its back on both

TO UNDERSTAND how far South Africa has strayed from Nelson Mandela’s legacy, one need only peruse the latest foreign-policy paper drafted by grandees of the ruling African National Congress (ANC). The fall of the Berlin Wall, it reads, marked not the freeing of captive nations in Europe but a regrettable triumph of Western imperialism. The pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square in China were an American-backed counter-revolution. Russia’s invasion of eastern Ukraine is a conflict “directed from Washington”. America’s policies in Africa and the Middle East have “the sole intention” of toppling democratic governments. As “part of the international revolutionary movement to liberate humanity from the bondage of imperialism”, South Africa should seek to have American military bases thrown out of Africa.

This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition under the headline “Clueless and immoral”

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