Trump backs South Africa ‘white genocide' claims with Congo footage
A screengrab from a video that US President Donald Trump presented as evidence of white farmers being killed in South Africa originated from footage of unrest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Reuters reported on Friday.
Trump showed the image during a White House meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Wednesday, holding up a printout of an article that featured a screengrab from the footage, which Reuters said it originally published on February 3.
According to the news agency, the video shows humanitarian workers handling body bags in Goma, one of the main cities in eastern Congo captured by M23 rebels amid intense fighting in late January.
The screengrab appeared in a blog post by conservative outlet American Thinker, which discussed conflicts in both South Africa and the DRC, but did not caption the image.
'These are all white farmers that are being buried,' Trump said.
'You have hundreds of people, thousands of people trying to come into our country because they feel they're going to be killed and their land is going to be confiscated. And you do have laws that were passed that give you the right to confiscate land,' he claimed.
Andrea Widburg, the managing editor at American Thinker and author of the post, told Reuters that Trump 'misidentified the image.' She said the article raised concerns about 'increasing pressure placed on white South Africans.'
Ramaphosa's visit to Washington was aimed at repairing diplomatic ties amid heightened tensions with the US over land policy, foreign affairs, and Trump's accusations of discrimination against the white minority.
During the meeting, the US president played a five-minute montage that included clips of South African political figures and images he claimed show graves of white farmers.
Ramaphosa rejected the claims, stating that South Africa is a multi-party democracy and that crime affects all communities. 'There's no genocide in South Africa. That is a fact that's borne out of a lot of evidence,' he said, adding that those shown in the video were not part of his government.
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