The Apartheid legislation started in 1948, when the National Party (NP) took reign in South Africa (SA) and this all-white government immediately began enforcing existing policies of racial segregation. The majority, non-white SAns were forced to live in separate areas from whites. Opposition to this was consistently strong within and outside of SA, but its laws remained in effect for almost 50 years.
Resistance to apartheid emanated through non-violent demonstrations, protests, strikes, political action and finally in armed resistance. In the black township of Sharpeville, in 1960, police opened fire on a group of unarmed blacks, when the group arrived at the police station without passes, inviting arrest as an act of resistance. 67 black
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protest action led to SA's exclusion from Olympic participation and international sport; academic and cultural boycott, and a consumer boycott of SA Outspan oranges; 'Artists United against Apartheid' was an organisation of musicians who protested Apartheid.
Campaigns were organised for the release of political prisoners and the Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute Concert, in 1988 in London, was watched on television by a billion people in over 60 countries, in which attention of the world was focussed powerfully on the cruel racist regime.
The United Nations Organisation (UNO) adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) in 1948, which is the basis for human rights protection and promotion around the world. The NP also came to power in SA, under which black SAns were denied basic human rights. This didn’t meet the standards of the UDHR. The apartheid government did not sign the UDHR, and apartheid was later declared a Crime against Humanity by the UNO. In 1989, the NP elected a new leader, F.W. de Klerk. The Berlin Wall fell in 1989, and the 'communist threat' which the NP had said it was fighting, no longer existed and the government lost the main reason for its internal oppression and aggressive foreign