Apartheid: the Tyranny of Racism Made Law

In white-ruled South Africa, black people are denied their basic human and political rights; their labour is exploited, their lives segregated, precarious and fearful. In 1982 almost one million of them were to be transferred to another country – Swaziland – without their having any say in the matter whatsoever. That is the tyranny of apartheid, of racism made law, of a system under which a small white minority holds all economic and political power, and dictates in the minutest detail how and where the large black majority will live, work and die. It is this system of institutionalized racial discrimination which defies the principles of the UN Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, that has set South Africa on a collision course with the rest of the world.

"Passport" of an inhabitant of Transkei, one of the nominally independent black "homelands" that have been created around the country, but have not been recognized as independent anywhere else in the world. Such documents do not allow blacks to travel very far. They are, in fact, like the "reference books" or "passes" that all blacks over 16 must have, designed to control their movements. [1982]

[This is an unprocessed archival image and not available for download. If you would like to use this image, please contact the UN Photo Library.]