Local News in Brief : Students Stage Sit-In at S. Africa Consulate
About 30 students staged a sit-in Friday outside the South African Consulate in Beverly Hills, vowing to stay there until Martin Luther King Day on Monday--barring their arrest.
The students, carrying sleeping bags, pillows and a change of clothes, camped on the third floor of the consulate office at 50 N. La Cienega Blvd. and sang, “We shall overcome.”
A consulate employee, peering through a window in one of the office doors, refused to respond to the students’ demands that he explain his country’s apartheid policy.
“He stood behind the window, then shut the blinds to us and refused to speak,” said Sonjia Stutsky, 16, a Beverly Hills High School junior.
She said the group planned to camp in the hall until Monday morning when a demonstration march is scheduled at 11 a.m. from the old consulate office on Wilshire Boulevard to the new La Cienega facility.
Police stationed outside the building said the students could stay as long as the building manager agreed.
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