UN Security Council urges SA government to end Rivonia Trial

On June 9, 1964, just two days before the final verdict was reached, the UN Security Council passed a resolution urging the South African government to end the Rivonia Trial in progress and grant amnesty to the defendants and all other political prisoners already sentenced to death. Britain, together with the US, France and Brazil, abstained. In the months preceding the Security Council debate Britain had been working with the US for a moderate UN resolution, which, while criticising South Africa's apartheid policy, would fall short of defining the situation in South Africa as a danger to international peace. A common British-American stand increased their chance of directing the course of events in the UN negotiations with the Africans. By gaining the initiative, Britain (and the US) wanted to avoid a situation in which it would have to react to an unsatisfactory African draft putting the question of apartheid in the context of the UN Charter. Another reason why the British Government was keen on getting the US involved in the South African question was that they did not want to find themselves 'alone in doubtful company' if they had to defy participation in international action Click here, to read SAHO's Chronology on United Nations and Apartheid.