Trump: ‘SA behaving badly… policies on exterminating people unacceptable’ [VIDEO]

United States (US) President Donald Trump has gone on a rant about South Africa, saying the country has “behaved badly” and is “exterminating people.”

Trump was speaking to reporters alongside Crown Prince and Prime minister Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia on Tuesday.

The US president was asked about Palestinians being shipped out on forced relocation flights from Gaza to South Africa.

Alleged extermination policies

However, instead of addressing the question, Trump launched into a rant about refusing to attend the G20 leaders’ summit in South Africa.

He slammed South Africa’s “policies on the extermination of people” amid Palestinian relocation flights from Gaza.

“I’m not going to South Africa for the G20 because I think their policies on the extermination of people are unacceptable. So I’m not going. South Africa has behaved extremely badly,” Trump told reporters.

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G20

Earlier this week, President Cyril Ramaphosa was urged to continue engaging with Trump despite his boycott of the G20 summit, which would succeed without the US’ participation.

“We will take fundamental decisions and their absence is their loss,” Ramaphosa told reporters in Cape Town.

“In many ways, the United States is also giving up the very important role that it should be playing as the biggest economy in the world.”

The US leader said no American official would set foot on South African soil for the high-level international gathering, claiming South Africa had committed genocide against Afrikaners, whom he had offered refugee status from May this year.

Ramaphosa last week said that the United States’ boycott of the G20 summit would not prevent the meeting of the world’s leading economies from going ahead.

Afrikaners

Trump has singled out South Africa for harsh treatment on several issues since he returned to the White House in January, notably making debunked claims of white Afrikaners being systematically “killed and slaughtered” in the country.

He ambushed Ramaphosa in the Oval Office earlier this year, playing a video in which he alleged a campaign against white farmers by the post-apartheid government.

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Refugee status

In May, Trump offered Afrikaners refugee status; the first group of around 50 was flown to the US on a chartered plane.

In October, South Africa criticised the decision by the US to prioritise refugee applications from white Afrikaners, saying claims of a white genocide have been widely discredited and lack reliable evidence.

The Trump administration stated in a document that the US refugee system would largely remain closed in 2026 to the millions of people worldwide fleeing unsafe conditions.

Inaccuracy

Department of International Relations and Cooperation (Dirco) spokesperson Chrispin Phiri slammed the decision, saying the programme remains concerning and still appears to rest on a “premise that is factually inaccurate and a disregard for our constitutional processes”.

“This claim of a ‘white genocide’ in South Africa is widely discredited and unsupported by reliable evidence,” said Phiri.

South Africa has also come under fire from the Trump administration over its case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

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