Two Bombs Injure 19 in South Africa

Two explosions less than half an hour apart hit downtown Johannesburg today, injuring at least 19 people at a fast food restaurant and a hotel.

The government’s Bureau of Information said it suspected the blasts were caused by limpet mines, explosives designed to cling to surfaces.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the explosions or any accusation by the government.

The outlawed African National Congress has claimed responsibility in the past for bombings around the country. The black guerrilla movement, which is trying to overthrow the white-minority government, says it concentrates its attacks on military and government targets. The government says the congress has increasingly staged attacks certain to result in civilian casualties.

Street Showered With Glass

The first explosion today went off at 2:01 p.m. at a half-full Wimpy’s restaurant on the ground floor of a department store building, showering glass onto busy Rissik Street. A government spokesman said 18 people, both blacks and whites, were injured.

Among those hurt was a 2-month-old baby, hit on the head by flying glass.

The second explosion came 25 minutes later outside the President Holiday Inn, and the government reported that a black man was injured.

Government spokesman Casper Venter said a third explosion caused by a demolition charge also occurred early today in a toilet at a stadium in Soweto, Johannesburg’s main black township, but caused no injuries.

Sampson Litshane, a waiter at Wimpy’s, said he saw two white women whose clothes were on fire.

“One ran into the street holding a baby, one fell on the floor inside,” Litshane said.

‘Like an Electric Shock’

Office worker Mariet Oosthuizen said the blast at the restaurant “was like an electric shock going through me. I saw people covered in blood and with their clothes torn.”

Venter said two black men were killed in other incidents between daybreak Monday and daybreak today, one shot by police near Witbank, east of Johannesburg, and the other believed shot by other blacks near the southern city of Uitenhage.

Officials said 59 people have been killed since June 12, when the government imposed a nationwide state of emergency.

In another development today, delegates at the annual conference of the South African Council of Churches voted to proceed with their scheduled discussion of the country’s problems despite the possibility that state-of-emergency restrictions on “subversive” statements might be violated. The council is known for its outspoken criticism of the government’s apartheid policies.

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