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“I ask you and all the leaders of the world: Would you act differently? Would you keep silent and do nothing if you were in our place?”

Source: Statement to the UN Special Committee on Apartheid, New York, 9 March 1964

Context Returning to the UN during the Rivonia trial, where Mandela and others faced possible death sentences, she appealed to world leaders to save the accused.

Portrait of Miriam Makeba
Miriam MakebaSouth Africa · 1932–2008
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