3 Ministers, 200 Protesters Held in S. Africa

Police today arrested three leading ministers and more than 200 of their supporters who fell to their knees and prayed when they were ordered to break up a march against white minority rule, witnesses said.

The protesters were rounded up after leaving a Methodist church in Cape Town, where a memorial service was held for 19 blacks shot to death by police last Thursday at Uitenhage, near Port Elizabeth.

Witnesses and the South African Press Assn. said police surrounded the crowd, which was marching toward the Parliament building half a mile away to protest white rule.

When police ordered the marchers to disperse, they dropped to their knees and began to pray and sing “Onward Christian Soldiers,” witnesses said.

The crowd remained calm as police led away the ministers, then packed the protesters into vans. Authorities said 239 were arrested and would be held for arraignment Wednesday.

Among those detained was Rev. Beyers Naude, secretary-general of the South African Council of Churches. Naude, a white, was once a high-ranking preacher in the pro-apartheid Dutch Reformed Church.

Allan Boesak, president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, also was taken away, the press association said. Boesak, a minister in the Dutch Reformed sister church for nonwhites, is of mixed race.

The Rev. Abel Hendriks, a white former leader of the Methodist Church, also was led away, the witnesses said.