City of Sandton
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa lamented Thursday that the U. S. Embassy issued a warning about an imaginable “terrorist” attack over the weekend in the country without consulting his government.
On Wednesday, the U. S. Embassy released the alert about its potential target known as Sandton, a suburb of the country’s financial center, Johannesburg.
Sandton, a collection of high-end boutiques and tall office buildings and banks, is known as the richest square mile on the African continent.
The alert indicated that the attack could occur there on Saturday.
“It is unfortunate that the United States has issued this kind of warning without having had any discussion with us,” Ramaphosa told a news conference.
“Any form of precaution will come from the government of the Republic of South Africa and it is unfortunate that the government issues such a risk that it will sow panic among our people,” Ramaphosa said.
He responded to a query at a joint press conference with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
Ramaphosa said Pretoria is “working 24 hours a day to look very closely at this message coming from the United States. “
Realization of the parade
The embassy said the U. S. government was not allowed to do so. The U. S. Department of State had “received reports that terrorists were making plans to carry out an attack targeting giant gatherings of other people at an unspecified location in the large Sandton domain in Johannesburg. “
The alert was temporarily shared on social media and WhatsApp teams in Johannesburg.
On Wednesday, Pretoria gave the impression of downplaying the alert, calling it “part of the U. S. government’s popular communication. “”U. S. citizens. “
When asked about Ramaphosa’s criticism, a spokesman for the U. S. State Department said he was asked about Ramaphosa. UU. no responded directly, but said the U. S. He believed it was imperative to have “real-time” alerts.
“We take seriously our commitment to providing U. S. citizens with clear, timely and reliable data on each and every country in the world so they can make informed decisions,” the spokesperson said.
Several warnings have been issued about imminent attacks imaginable in South Africa in recent years, but none have materialized.
A big-name local news site, News24, on Thursday cited anonymous resources suggesting that a gay parade planned in Sandton on Saturday and a comedy exhibition through a prominent South African comedian of Jewish descent may have been the possible targets.
Johannesburg Pride organizers vowed to go ahead with the parade, which returns after a two-year hiatus due to restrictions similar to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The event “was not directly threatened, and we did not get any communication from outdoor parties other than what the media assumed through the U. S. Embassy website,” they said in a statement.
“Pride began as a campaign of defiance and we will not face any threat based on sexual orientation and gender identity. All lives matter,” they said.
“It is up to us to occupy the area we intend to occupy on October 29. We have to go out into the street and. . . affirm our visibility,” they added.
News24 said ongoing peace talks between the Ethiopian warring parties in the capital, Pretoria, had also been “flagged through South African intelligence agencies as a target. “
“We are very involved with terrorism,” Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor said Thursday.
“Our security organs are paying for this case. “
Mozambique’s neighbor South Africa is battling an Islamist insurgency and has deployed more than 1,000 troops there since July last year.
The U. S. Embassy The U. S. government also issued a security alert in Nigeria on Sunday, urging U. S. citizens to restrict their access due to a “high threat of terrorist attacks in Nigeria, specifically in Abuja. “
After the U. S. With the U. S. and Britain issuing a security alert in 2016, South Africa reacted angrily to what it described as “attempts to generate perceptions of government incompetence, alarmist impressions and public hysteria on the basis of a dubious single source. “