Blinken pays tribute to Soweto Uprising at start of Africa tour

Soweto, South Africa – (AFP):

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken kicked off a three-nation African trip Sunday paying tribute to the Soweto Uprising, a student protest whose tragic ending galvanized the world against the apartheid regime.

His visit comes as Washington scales up diplomacy to counter Russian influence on the continent and follows hot on the heels of an extensive tour of Africa by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

For his first stop, the US top diplomat chose South Africa, a leader in the developing world, which has remained neutral in the Ukraine war, refusing to join Western calls to condemn Moscow, which had opposed apartheid before the end of white minority rule in 1994.

Blinken toured the Hector Pieterson Museum, built in memory of students killed in a 1976 protest which became one of the watersheds in the anti-apartheid movement.

He made reference to the iconic black-and-white picture of a dying Hector Pieterson being carried away by a teary fellow student after security forces opened fire on young protesters.

Over 170 were gunned down when thousands of black students protested at being forced to study in Afrikaans, the language of the white-minority regime.

It is Blinken’s second trip to Africa since his appointment early last year.

He will visit the Democratic Republic of Congo later this week, with the aim of boosting support for sub-Saharan Africa’s biggest country as it battles to turn the page on decades of conflict.

Blinken’s tour will then wind up in Rwanda, which has seen a flare-up in tensions with DR Congo after it accused Rwanda of backing M23 rebels, a charge Kigali denies.