The United States has imposed travel restrictions targeting senior South African officials and their family members over their alleged role in “race-based discrimination and incitement of imminent violence”.
In the latest onslaught on Pretoria by Washington, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced that President Donald Trump’s government is imposing visa restrictions on South Africa over “uncompensated land seizures” and race-based discrimination in the form of the country’s black economic empowerment laws.
He said new visa policy will be targeting “foreign nationals involved in race-based discrimination and incitement of imminent violence” against racial and ethnic minorities.
“The South African people are being failed by a government that is destroying its economy through an obsessive pursuit of racial grievance against the Afrikaner minority,” he said in a statement.
He however did not mention names of the targeted individuals.
Similar to the “targeted” visa restrictions previously imposed by the US on senior officials from neighbouring Zimbabwe in the early 2000s, the latest US move would see South African officials being denies visas or having them revoked. They would only be issued visas when going to the US for United Nations business.
This is the latest in ongoing diplomatic tensions between the US and South Africa since the latter took Israel, a key US ally, to the International Court of Justice in 2023 over its genocidal war against Palestinians.
The dispute further worsened after President Cyril Ramaphosa signed in early 2025 the Expropriation Act, which allows his government to acquire land in the public interest without compensation.
Trump responded to this by accusing the South African government of adopting policies targeting white Afrikaners, some of whom he offered refuge in the US.
JN/APA