Aftermath: Sharpeville Massacre 1960 | South African History Online But attempts to transform this non-binding moral declaration into a binding legal code were immediately bogged down in Cold War disputes. How the 1960 Sharpeville massacre sparked the birth of international Along the way small groups of people joined him. But even still, southern activists worked to defend the practice of segregation. Following the Brown decision, grassroots African American activists began challenging segregation through protests continuing into the 1960s (Aiken et al., 2013). Later, in the fifties and the sixties, these same goals, enlign poll taxes and literacy tests, were once again fought for by African American leaders, through advocacy and agitation. This day is now commemorated annually in South Africa as a public . The Sharpeville massacre occurred on 21 March 1960 at the police station in the township of Sharpeville in the then Transvaal Province of the then Union of South Africa (today part of Gauteng). Fewer than 20 police officers were present in the station at the start of the protest. Race, ethnicity and political groups, is an example of this. However, the governments method of controlling people who resisted the apartheid laws didnt have the same effect from the early 1970s and onward. What were the causes of the Sharpeville Massacre? - eNotes At its inaugural session in 1947, the UN Commission on Human Rights had decided that it had no power to take any action in regard to any complaints concerning human rights. African Americans demonstrated their frustration with lack of progress on the issue through non-violent means and campaigns led by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr (Bourne, In a march against segregation and barriers for African-American voting rights, peaceful marchers were exposed to harsh treatment by the police, 50 being hospitalized by the terrorism inflicted on them (civilrights.org). Just after 1pm, there was an altercation between the police officer in charge and the leaders of the demonstration. In response, a police officer shouted in Afrikaans skiet or nskiet (exactly which is not clear). The key developments were the adoption of Resolution 1235 in 1967, which allowed for the examination of complaints of gross violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms, as exemplified by the policy of apartheid, and Resolution 1503 in 1970, which allowed the UN to examine complaints of a consistent pattern of gross and reliably attested violations of human rights. The Black Consciousness Movement sparked mass protests among Blacks and prompted other liberation movements to demonstrate against the apartheid. Police officers attempted to use tear gas to repel these advances, but it proved ineffectual, and the police fell back on the use of their batons. Furthermore, the history of the African civil rights movement validated: Nationalism has been tested in the peoples struggles . Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree.
