I was shocked to learn that Mr Stephen Biko, Honorary President of the Black People's Convention and an outstanding leader of the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa, died in detention on 12 September.

This is one more despicable crime by the apartheid regime which has murdered a score of patriots in the past year in its police cells. It is a crime against the oppressed people of South Africa, and indeed, against the United Nations which has proclaimed special responsibility for them. It shows that the apartheid regime is incorrigible, and that any hesitation or delay in decisive international action to enable the national liberation movement to destroy that regime is, in effect, a condonation of crimes against the patriots.

The judgment of the magistrate in the inquest over the death of Mr. Steve Biko is a contemptible farce which can only be enacted by the institution of apartheid. It should open the eyes of those who saw a modicum of judicial propriety in racist courts managed by racist officials under racist laws.

I must congratulate the courageous Biko family and their able lawyers for laying bare the identity and the savagery of the murderers of Biko and their instigators and protectors. The people of South Africa and of the world have made their judgment, and the guilty men from the so-called Ministers to the Security Policemen will not escape just punishment…

I wish to draw attention to the fact that the continued repression and acts of violence by the apartheid regime are a flagrant violation of the Security Council resolution of 29 October. The Council must take action, without any further delay, to stop its crimes.