Vorster angers Kaunda

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32589, 24 April 1971, Page 17

Vorster angers Kaunda

(N.Z.PA.-Reuter— i Copyright) CAPE TOWN, April 23. The South African Prime Minister (Mr Vorster) has reaffirmed his readiness for summit talks with black African leaders about his country’s apartheid policies.

“I am prepared to have discussions with any African leader on an equal basis—namely, as the leader of one country with that of another,” he told Parliament He said that he was now looking forward to the press conference that President Houphduet-Boigny of the Ivory Coast—a supporter of dialogue with South Africa — would hold next week.

Mr Vorster told the House: "This West African leader is a highly-civilised man who is well versed in politics. It will be interesting to me to see what he has to say.”

The Prime Minister’s statement was a recapitulation of his declaration, made to an international press conference in Cape Town last month, that he was ready for top-level talks with African leaders in an attempt to end black-white hostility of the African Continent. President HouphouetBoigny is regarded in South Africa as one of the architects of the idea of “peacemaking” discussions between South Africa and black African States. Mr Vorster’s new bid for black-white talks came after his allegation in Parliament the previous day that he had been holding private diplo-

matic contacts with Zambia during the last few years at the same time as President Kaunda, of Zambia, was publicly denouncing the idea of a black-white dialogue and calling on other African states to boycott South Africa.

In Lusaka yesterday a Zambian Foreign Ministry statement described Mr Vorster’s allegation as “utter fabrication at a very high level ... a bitter and personal attack on President Kaunda.” Zambia would not allow her President to be used as a scapegoat for South Africa’s difficulties in launching her proposed dialogue with the nations of black Africa, the Ministry statement said.

In his speech, Mr Vorster had referred to exchanges between South Africa and Zambia, in which

the possibility of a meeting with President Kaunda—a staunch opponent of apartheid—had been discussed.

The Zambian Foreign Ministry said that the initiative for such a meeting had come from the South African side; South Africa had been making overtures through secret envoys since 1968.

“These attempts, as correspondence is available to prove, failed because of the irreconcilable political philosophies of President Kaunda and Mr Vorster on the central question of the dignity and equality of man,” the Ministry said. "The tone of the South African Prime Minister’s attack on the Zambian Head of State, and its timing, are sufficient evidence of the depth of the strains and stresses that South Africa must be undergoing,” it added.