First white South Africans flying to US under Trump refugee plan

The first group of 49 white South Africans to be granted refugee status by President Donald Trump’s administration are due to arrive shortly in the US.

On Sunday they boarded a flight from Johannesburg which is due to land in Washington DC later on Monday.

Relations between South Africa and the US have been tense for months, after an executive order in February in which President Trump stated that Afrikaners were victims of “racial discrimination”.

This was dismissed by South Africa’s Foreign Minister Ronald Lamoa, who said on Monday “there is no persecution of white Afrikaner South Africans”, adding that police reports debunk President Trump’s assertion.

The US has criticised domestic South African policy, accusing the government of seizing land from white farmers without any compensation – something which the southern African nation says has not happened.

President Trump has also highlighted what he has described as the “large-scale killing of farmers” in South Africa.

One of his closest advisers, South African-born Elon Musk, has previously said there was a “genocide of white people” in South Africa and accused the government of passing “racist ownership laws”.

The claims of a genocide of white people have been widely discredited. Figures from the South African police show that in 2024, 44 murders were recorded on farms and smaller plots of agricultural land, with eight of those killed being farmers.

Credit: bbc.com

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