WORLD : Baker Urges De Klerk to Lift S. Africa State of Emergency

In the highest-level contact between the United States and South Africa in 12 years, Secretary of State James A. Baker III today told South African President Frederik de Klerk that his government must end a nearly 4-year-old state of emergency before Washington lifts economic sanctions.

Baker met with an African National Congress delegation, which criticized the first visit in 12 years by a U.S. secretary of state on the ground that it gives the government’s reform program legitimacy that the black anti-apartheid group feels has not been earned.

Despite the protest by the ANC, Baker then met with De Klerk, who said he did not consider Baker’s visit a reward for recent reforms but “proof of the interest which America has in this region.”

Baker said De Klerk told him that Pretoria wants to end the national state of emergency and free political prisoners.

Baker said the U.S. government hoped that the state of emergency would be ended “at an appropriate time, consistent, of course, with the maintenance of law and order.”