S. Africa’s Worst Bombing in Year Kills 4, Injures 19; ANC Blamed
A bomb hidden in a trash bin exploded Friday at a busy street corner on the outskirts of Johannesburg, killing four people and injuring 19 in South Africa’s deadliest bombing in more than a year.
Law and Order Minister Adriaan Vlok blamed the African National Congress movement, which has been accused of four other bombings in the past nine days.
The ANC has not commented on the recent bombings. However, it issued a statement Friday from its headquarters in Lusaka, Zambia, saying that the month of June “must be a period of united and decisive popular offensive” against the government.
The bomb Friday exploded at 1:30 p.m. outside a branch of the Standard Bank in Roodepoort, a city that borders the west side of Johannesburg. Three black men and a white woman were killed.
A Roodepoort police spokesman, Maj. Tiene Halgryn, said eight people were seriously injured, including two whites and six blacks.
Police said most of the victims had been waiting at the street corner for a traffic light to change. The blast, caused by a Soviet-made limpet mine, shattered windows in the bank and nearby stores in Roodepoort’s central business district.
The death toll in Roodepoort was the highest from a bombing in South Africa since a car bomb killed four white policemen in Johannesburg in May, 1987.
The ANC is the main guerrilla group fighting the white-minority led South African government.
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