A group of 4,000 people who appeared to be foreign
nationals set a barricade on fire in a major intersection of Durban’s
Point district Tuesday, News24 reports.
Authorities appeared to be engaged in mediation
effort with leaders of the mob. Earlier, police fired bullets at a crowd
of nearly 2,000 locals after a stand-off between Pakistani shop owners and
locals, according to News24.
South African police say a wave of attacks
started last week in Durban when locals accused a supermarket of
firing workers and hiring foreigners to replace them.
Bloomberg reports
that a 14-year-old boy was allegedly shot and killed during looting of
immigrants’ shops Monday night, bringing the death toll from the violence to at
least five. About 48 suspects have been arrested since April 11.
Attacks flared up in January against Ethiopian,
Somali and Pakistani immigrants in
Johannesburg townships after a Somali shop
owner shot and killed a 14-year-old boy during an alleged burglary.
This is the worst anti-foreigner violence since
2008, when about 60 people were killed and 50,000 displaced from their homes,
Bloomberg reports.
Three camps have been set up near Durban to
accommodate 1,272-to-1,472 immigrants who have fled their homes.
The government blames criminals, not
xenophobia, for much of the violence. But “we cannot ignore the fact that
it’s stemming from South Africans saying that they don’t want foreign nationals
in the country, so there’s an element of xenophobia,” said Nomagugu Mlawe, an
attorney at Lawyers for Human Rights in Durban, in a Bloomberg interview. “The
communities and societies are preying on the most vulnerable and taking out the
frustrations on that vulnerable group of people.”
When refugees and asylum seekers arrive in
South Africa and present themselves to the authorities, the majority
get documents that allow them to stay legally, said Clementine
Nkweta-Salami, Southern Africa representative for the U.N. High Commissioner
for Refugees, in a statement. “To lump them in the category of illegal migrants
or unlawful residents is not only incorrect but also serves to stigmatize
them.”
