Blacks Stone Tourist Bus in S. Africa, Battle Police

Rampaging youths hurled rocks at foreign tourists, hijacked buses and clashed with mounted police firing shotguns today in the year’s first major rioting in Soweto, South Africa’s biggest black township, police said.

At least eight people suffered shotgun wounds as police in trucks, on horseback and backed by dogs battled crowds of up to 1,500 in the city about 10 miles southwest of Johannesburg.

Police briefly arrested more than 400 youths who hijacked eight buses and ordered drivers to take them to the Protea police station and court complex, where 105 blacks were to be tried for holding an illegal public meeting.

Tourist Bus Attacked

As gangs of young blacks rampaged through Soweto, one group attacked a bus carrying seven tourists, including one American, on a daily government-organized tour. Soweto experienced the worst violence in the 1976 black uprising in which more than 600 people were killed.

Three windows on the bus were smashed, said a spokesman for Horizon Tours, which organized the outing. In addition to the American man, three Englishwomen and a German couple and their son were aboard. One of the Englishwomen suffered a cut foot.

Police fired shotguns, rubber bullets and tear gas from armored trucks to disperse mobs throughout the township, which had been relatively quiet during 10 months of renewed racial unrest that has claimed at least 470 lives.

At the Protea court complex, mounted police with dogs also fired shotguns, rubber bullets and tear gas to drive away 1,500 people gathered in support of the 105 blacks charged for illegally meeting outside a black mayor’s home Saturday.

Charges against the 105 were dropped and they were sent home “pending further investigation.” The 400 youths arrested for hijacking the buses were released after the bus company declined to press charges.