Editorial: Foreign policy needs leadership
Mail & Guardian Online - 1 hour ago
Rwanda is exploiting South Africa's diminished international stature
to challenge our foreign policy.

The fierce diplomatic exchanges between Rwanda and South Africa over
the past week should prod Pretoria into reviewing its foreign policy,
particularly towards the continent.
The loathed apartheid government's foreign policy in Africa made
extensive use of its state military power, which was used to throttle
its weaker neighbours. Thankfully, as the first president of a free
South Africa, Nelson Mandela instilled a foreign policy based on human
rights, and his successor Thabo Mbeki reasserted South Africa's
authority on the continent.
But the country's international stature has shrunk since 2009;
positions taken at the United Nations and in the African Union often
undermine the Mandela style of foreign policy. Rwanda is the latest to
have noticed this, and is now exploiting it to challenge South
Africa's foreign policy.
It was a foreign-policy blunder for Pretoria to allow questionable
former generals from Rwanda to settle here. Rwanda reacted by
violently pursuing these "fugitives" to Sandton, causing a diplomatic
storm. South Africa can't afford to have hit squads pursuing victims
on South African soil, any more than it can afford to give refuge to
suspected political fugitives.
Now there are tit-for-tat diplomatic expulsions on both sides, while
the pussyfooting continues elsewhere. Yet South Africa has nothing to
lose if it severs ties with Kigali; it should be able to tell Rwanda
to go and jump. Such diplomatic courage, however, requires decisive
leadership.
South Africa's weak diplomatic standing means that Rwanda's foreign
minister can get away with an arrogant response – one similar to the
way Robert Mugabe cocked a snook at Pretoria's diplomatic authority
when he lambasted South Africa's senior foreign policy adviser because
she proposed that the Zimbabwean elections be delayed to ensure
fairness. Other disturbing incidents include the derogatory comments
about South Africa's leadership made by Zambia's vice-president and
Nigeria's 2012 expulsion of scores of South Africans after South
Africa deported 123 Nigerians.
The lack of a strong diplomatic response based firmly on a commitment
to human rights everywhere – not just at home – makes it more likely
that we will have to endure similar embarrassments and upsets in the
future.
http://www.google.ca/gwt/x?gl=CA&hl=en-CA&u=http://mg.co.za/article/2014-03-13-editorial-foreign-policy-needs-leadership&q=Editorial:+Foreign+policy+needs+leadership
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SIBOMANA Jean Bosco
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