White South Africans arrive in US under Trump refugee plan

A bunch of 59 white South Africans has arrived within the US, the place they’re to be granted refugee standing.

President Donald Trump has mentioned the refugee purposes for the nation’s Afrikaner minority had been expedited as they have been victims of “racial discrimination”.

The South African authorities mentioned the group weren’t struggling any such persecution that will advantage refugee standing.

The Trump administration has halted all different refugee admissions, together with for candidates from warzones. Human Rights Watch described the transfer as a merciless racial twist, saying that hundreds of individuals – many black and Afghan refugees – had been denied refuge within the US.

The group of white South Africans, who landed at Dulles airport close to Washington DC on Monday, obtained a heat welcome from US authorities.

Some held younger youngsters and waved small American flags within the arrival space adorned with crimson, white and blue balloons on the partitions.

The processing of refugees within the US typically takes months, even years, however this group has been quick tracked. UNHCR – the United Nations refugee company – confirmed to the BBC it wasn’t concerned within the vetting, as is often the case.

Requested immediately on Monday why the Afrikaners’ refugee purposes had been processed quicker than different teams, Trump mentioned a “genocide” was going down and that “white farmers” particularly have been being focused.

“Farmers are being killed, they happen to be white, but whether they’re white or black makes no difference to me.”

However South African President Cyril Ramaphosa mentioned he advised Trump throughout a cellphone name the US evaluation of the scenario was “not true”.

“A refugee is someone who has to leave their country out of fear of political persecution, religious persecution, or economic persecution,” Ramaphosa mentioned. “And they don’t fit that bill.”

In response to a query from the BBC at Dulles airport, Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau mentioned: “It is not surprising, unfortunately, that a country from which refugees come does not concede that they are refugees.”

The US has criticised home South African coverage, accusing the federal government of seizing land from white farmers with none compensation.

In January President Ramaphosa signed a controversial regulation permitting the federal government to grab privately owned land with out compensation in sure circumstances, when it’s deemed “equitable and in the public interest”.

However the authorities says no land has but been seized underneath the act.

There was frustration in South Africa over the sluggish tempo of land reform within the three a long time because the finish of the racist apartheid system.

Whereas black South Africans make up greater than 90% of the inhabitants, they solely maintain 4% of all privately owned land, in response to a 2017 report.

One in every of Trump’s closest advisers, South African-born Elon Musk, has beforehand mentioned there was a “genocide of white people” in South Africa and accused the federal government of passing “racist ownership laws”.

The claims of a genocide of white individuals have been widely discredited.

In an announcement to the BBC, Gregory Meeks, rating Democratic member of the Home International Affairs Committee, mentioned the Trump administration’s refugee resettlement was “not just a racist dog whistle, it’s a politically motivated rewrite of history”.

The Episcopal Church mentioned it could now not work with the federal authorities on refugee settlement due to the “preferential treatment” granted for the Afrikaners.

Commenting on this information on X, Vice-President JD Vance posted, “Crazy”.

Melissa Keaney, a lawyer with the Worldwide Refugee Help mission, advised the BBC the White Home’s determination to fast-track the Afrikaners’ arrival amounted to “a lot of hypocrisy and unequal treatment”.

Her organisation is suing the Trump administration after it indefinitely suspended the US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP) in January. She mentioned that coverage had left over 120,000 conditionally authorized refugees in limbo.

Afrikaner writer Max du Preez advised the BBC’s Newsday radio programme that claims of persecution of white South Africans have been a “total absurdity” and “based on nothing”.

Figures from the South African police present that in 2024, 44 murders have been recorded on farms and smaller plots of agricultural land, with eight of these killed being farmers.

South Africa doesn’t report on crime statistics damaged down by race however a majority of the nation’s farmers are white, whereas different individuals dwelling on farms, reminiscent of staff, are principally black.

Bilateral relations between the US and South Africa have been strained since President Trump first tasked his administration with resettling Afrikaners, a gaggle with principally Dutch ancestry, within the US.

In March, South Africa’s ambassador to the US, Ebrahim Rasool, was expelled after accusing President Trump of utilizing “white victimhood as a dog whistle”, resulting in the US accusing Mr Rasool of “race-baiting”.

The US has additionally criticised South Africa for taking an “aggressive” place in opposition to Israel on the Worldwide Courtroom of Justice (ICJ), the place Pretoria has accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s authorities of genocide against Palestinians – a declare the Israelis strongly reject.

President Trump’s openness to accepting Afrikaner refugees comes because the US has engaged in a wider crackdown on migrants and asylum seekers from different nations.

Further reporting by Khanyisile Ngcobo in Johannesburg & Cai Pigliucci in Washington DC