Two Ghanaian nationals have petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a preliminary investigation into attacks against \u200bforeign nationals in South Africa, which they said could constitute crimes against humanity.<\/p>\n
South \u200cAfrica has been gripped by a surge in\u00a0anti-immigrant protests\u00a0in recent months, accompanied in some cases by violence against foreigners, whom protesters blame for problems such as crime and unemployment. Several African migrants have been \u200bkilled in the violence, while others have been beaten and have seen their\u00a0homes and \u200bshops looted. Tens of thousands have fled the country.<\/p>\n
The petition, which has \u2060been seen by Reuters and was submitted to the court on July 15, alleges a “pattern \u200bof widespread and systematic attacks” against migrants in South Africa and accuses President Cyril Ramaphosa’s \u200bgovernment of failing to prevent or punish those crimes, including murder.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for South Africa’s foreign affairs ministry said the petition was opportunistic.<\/p>\n
“South Africa has a sophisticated domestic legal framework and legislation provides comprehensive safeguards and \u200benforcement measures against discrimination of any kind, including intolerance on the grounds of social origin,” \u200bthe spokesperson, Chrispin Phiri, told Reuters.<\/p>\n
The petition was filed by Palgrave Boakye-Danquah, a former Ghanaian government spokesperson \u200con governance \u2060and security, and Emmanuel Kotin, a counter-terrorism and security analyst.<\/p>\n
“For years, African brothers and sisters have been killed, beaten, and driven from their homes in South Africa,” they said in a press release.<\/p>\n
‘SERIOUS QUESTIONS’<\/strong><\/p>\n “While we commend individuals in South Africa who have condemned these acts, the \u200bpattern, scale, and recurrence \u200bof the violence \u2060raise serious questions about the failure of state authorities to prevent, investigate, and punish these crimes,” it said.<\/p>\n A spokesperson for Ramaphosa did not \u200bimmediately reply to a request for comment. Ramaphosa has previously condemned the \u200battacks and \u2060warned against scapegoating immigrants for deep-rooted problems.<\/p>\n The ICC, which prosecutes war crimes and crimes against humanity, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two Ghanaian nationals have petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a preliminary investigation into attacks against \u200bforeign nationals in South Africa, which they said could constitute crimes against humanity. South \u200cAfrica has been gripped by a surge in\u00a0anti-immigrant protests\u00a0in recent months, accompanied in some cases by violence against foreigners, whom protesters blame for problems […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17929,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":1,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2362,2377,30],"tags":[158,122,2058],"class_list":["post-21566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-migration","category-southern-africa","tag-ghana","tag-south-africa","tag-xenophobic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21566"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21566\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21567,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21566\/revisions\/21567"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}