Call for sanctions against S.A.

Press, 24 February 1987, Page 33

Call for sanctions against S.A.

PA Wellington • The National Council of Churches has called on the Government to adopt a stronger stance against apartheid in South Africa. Delegates at the council’s final general meeting adopted a resolution saying, “We call on the New Zealand Government to institute Immediately comprehensive and mandatory sanctions against South Africa as a remaining method of non-violent opposition to apartheid.”

The council’s news media liaison officer, Mr lan Harris, said a report prepared for the meeting noted it was disappointing that sanctions supported by the New Zealand Government had an impact on "only 20 per cent of our imports and none of our exports.”

Salvation Army delegates abstained from voting on the resolution and .it was opposed by the Liberal Catholic Church and the Cook Islands Christian Church, Mr Harris said. The meeting unanimously adopted a resolution on the Treaty of Waitangi, delegates declaring they would take full account of the treaty’s implications in whatever work they did.

The National Council of Churches, founded in 1941, will be replaced in January next year by the Conference of Churches in Aotearoa-New Zealand. The National Council of Churches’ secretary, Mrs Jocelyn Armstrong, said the organisation had been a catalyst for greater ecumenical understanding in New Zealand.