US Trump Signs Order to Cut Funding for South Africa

The United States allocated nearly $440 million in assistance to South Africa in 2023, the most recent US government data shows.

South Africa's foreign ministry said on Saturday the executive order "lacks factual accuracy and fails to recognize South Africa's profound and painful history of colonialism and apartheid."

The White House said Washington will also formulate a plan to resettle white South African farmers and their families as refugees, Reuters news agency reported. 

It said US officials would take steps to prioritize humanitarian relief, including admission and resettlement through the United States Refugee Admissions Program for Afrikaners in South Africa, who are mostly white descendants of early Dutch and French settlers.

South Africa's foreign ministry said, "It is ironic that the executive order makes provision for refugee status in the US for a group in South Africa that remains amongst the most economically privileged, while vulnerable people in the US from other parts of the world are being deported and denied asylum despite real hardship."