Police have been stretched as looting of foreign owned shops continue in the Umlazi and Kwamashu areas on Monday evening. Jeff Wicks for News24, reported that riot police have been stationed in Gale Street in central Durban.
He said some of the police had to be redeployed from Umlazi to attend to the volatile scene.
Earlier police fired stun grenades at a group of protesters outside the Dalton Road hostel in Umlazi, KwaZulu-Natal.
The latest protest follows the looting of shops in KwaMashu on Monday morning, after an outbreak of overnight violence aimed at foreign-owned businesses.
According to News24’s Giordano Stolley, a group of 300 protesters who gathered at the Dalton Road hostel were being followed by 100 police.
He said after protesters returned to the hostel, shots were fired and public order police (POP) called in.
“People were hanging out of the windows shouting abuse at police,” Stolley reported.
Police then fired tear gas on the crowd, who then marched out of the hostel and towards Gale Street.
According to POP about five or six shots were heard in the hostel after they fired stun grenades.
Thousands of foreign nationals from Zimbabwe, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia and Somalia have been displaced following the xenophobic attacks.
Close to 2,000 foreigners are being housed in three temporary makeshift camps.
According to police spokesman Thulani Zwane, four people have died in the violence, but some media reports put the figure at six. A total of 17 people have been arrested in the last two weeks.
Zimbabwe’s consul-general in South Africa, Henry Mukonoweshuro, told SABC news that diplomatic ties between South Africa and Zimbabwe will not be affected by the on-going xenophobic attacks in the greater Ethekwini metropolitan municipality.
There have been reports of attacks in Umlazi, Kwamashu, Inanda and Siyanda. Durban head of provincial government communications, Thami Ngwenya, said the situation is tense but stable.
Human rights campaigner China Ngobese says the attacks on foreigners are worrying.
Last year the South African Human Rights Commission said the term xenophobia, which has been used to describe the violence against foreigners, should be called afrophobia as Africans seem to be targeted. – News24.com