Ambassador Roelf Meyer, a former chief mediator who helped end apartheid in the 1990s, told the BBC that the facts about violence in South Africa had been misrepresented. 'The notion of a mass attack on the white Afrikaner minority in South Africa does not exist,' he said, adding that his identity as 'a born Afrikaner' gave him legitimacy to say so. Meyer was appointed ambassador in April after diplomatic relations between the US and South Africa soured over the issue.
Since last year, nearly 13,000 refugees have been admitted to the US under the refugee pathway for Afrikaners, and all but three were South African, according to BBC reporting. The new proposal would admit up to 17,500 more Afrikaners in the next year.
Meanwhile, an Afrikaner lobby group has planted thousands of white crosses on the National Mall in Washington DC, which it says represent victims of a genocide of white people in South Africa. The installation has drawn attention to the debate over safety of white farmers in South Africa.
One refugee, identified only as Lielie, told the BBC she moved with her family to Texas from a farm in South Africa, where they grew macadamia nuts and bananas. Despite walls, an electric fence, and eight bull terriers, she said she felt 'fear the whole time' and recalled that friends of her husband were 'brutally attacked'. She noted nothing was stolen and she was not harmed.
Meyer said he had never received a clear answer about where the 'misdirection of information' about a white genocide came from. Last year, Trump accused South Africa of white genocide in a meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa at the White House, leading to the creation of the refugee pathway.