Africa 'must speak out'

2006-04-20 09:26

Dakar - Human rights and civil society associations on Wednesday condemned Africa's silence over the murder in Russia of a Senegalese student in a racist attack early this month.

Samba Lampsar Sall, 28, a telecommunications student, was shot dead on April 8 outside a Saint Petersburg nightclub by a man whose gun was decorated with a swastika.

The grouping deplored "the absence of or the lukewarm reactions of Africa in the face of such acts and racist crimes perpetrated almost everywhere in the developed countries".

The group said: "We express our deep indignation, our disapproval and our unreserved condemnation against the abominable, odious crime and cowardly act."

Activists of African Unity, an non-governmental organisation representing Africans living in this city, said nine African students had been killed in Saint Petersburg over the past year.

- AFP