African Affairs: Caprivi Blast Kills South African



African Affairs:
Caprivi Blast Kills South African

Land-mine explosions October 4 and 5 in the Caprivi Strip area of Namibia (South-West Africa) killed a South African army officer and wounded four policemen, according to an announcement October 5 by Prime Minister John Vorster. [See 1971 South Africa: Land Mine Kills Police; Other Developments]

The first blast, which occurred five miles west of Katima Mulilo, injured the policemen, who were riding in a motor vehicle. Captain H. T. S. van Eeden was killed the following morning while on an inspection trip in the vicinity of the first explosion.

In disclosing the incident to members of his party's annual Transvaal Congress in Pretoria October 5, Vorster repeated his government's warnings against "Communist-trained terrorists," saying they would be pursued "wherever they might flee.... This has therefore been done in this case, and should the pursuers be attacked, they will defend themselves. The responsibility in this case rests squarely on the shoulders of the country making available its territory for this sort of aggression."

Although Vorster's announcement was generally taken by the South African and foreign press to mean that government troops had entered Zambia in pursuit of the guerrillas, Vorster declared October 6: "I never said that the police crossed the border." He criticized South African press coverage of the events as "irresponsible" and said: "The time has come for a confrontation [with the press] over these problems."

Stephanus Lourens Muller, minister of police, underlined Vorster's earlier denial October 7 when he remarked: "After the land-mine explosions, the police, as a matter of course, carried out follow-up work, but they definitely did not enter the territory of any foreign country in the process."

The London Times October 8 reported that a spokesman for the South-West African People's Organization (SWAPO) had claimed the previous day his group's guerrillas operated from Namibia rather than from Zambia.

In the United Nations October 8, Burundi, Somalia, Sierra Leone and Syria called on the Security Council to condemn "the violations of Zambian sovereignty, air space and territorial integrity." [See 1971 United Nations: Reports on Africa]

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