The Authority of ECOWAS Heads of State and Government has condemned the barbaric, criminal and xenophobic murder of innocent African foreigners in South Africa, urging the South African Government to act quickly to stop the increasing wave of attacks across its country.

An ECOWAS statement signed by the Chair of the Authority, HE John Dramani Mahama, President of the Republic of Ghana, also condemned the individual South Africans involved in the act.

The West African body described as a pity, the fact that the very people, whose nations sacrificed to help South Africans fight, repel and defeat apartheid, will today be considered aliens and hacked to death in such barbaric manners.

“We welcome the statement of our brother, President Jacob Zuma, and his assurances of a peaceful resolution, but we request for an urgent national action plan, backed by a behavioral change campaign against xenophobia in South Africa”, the statement added.