
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, November 20, 1993                   TAG: 9311200092
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

HOUSE VOTES TO LIFT SANCTIONS

With strong bipartisan support, the House on Friday voted to lift all remaining economic sanctions against South Africa.

The legislation also lays the groundwork for future U.S. aid to South Africa to support the transition to democracy once a freely elected interim government is in place.

The bill, the South African Democratic Transition Act, was approved by voice vote and sent to the Senate after a brief debate.

"We have witnessed dramatic events in South Africa since Nelson Mandela's release from prison just 3 1/2 years ago," said Rep. Harry Johnston, D-Fla., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on Africa.

"Black South Africans will be granted human rights and civil rights, including the right to vote," he said.

Rep. Donald Payne, D-N.J., a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, said that the move to non-racial democracy in South Africa is proof that "economic sanctions do work when enough time is allowed to permit them to work."

But the time for the end to U.S. sanctions has come, Payne said, because "Nelson Mandela and the ANC have made it clear that the transition to democracy will not work unless the economy is given a boost."

Mandela, president of the African National Congress, urged the lifting of sanctions in a speech before the United Nations on Sept. 24.

During debate in the Foreign Affairs Committee, the bill was amended to bar future aid to any organization in South Africa engaging in violence.

by CNB