'White Wolf' ready to murder blacks again

BAREND STRYDOM, self-proclaimed 'White Wolf', said yesterday in his first newspaper interview after his release a week ago as a political prisoner that he would mow down another eight black people in cold blood 'if necessary'.

In an interview with the Afrikaans Rapport newspaper, which paid him for its 'exclusive', Mr Strydom said he saw himself as a freedom fighter who had carried out the massacre in broad daylight in central Pretoria four years ago out of love for his fellow whites.

'I am not sorry. To have regrets would have implied I did something wrong. I did nothing wrong. If necessary, I would murder again,' he said.

'My action was not impulsive but fully planned ahead of time. My attack was to serve as a counter to the terror campaign being waged by the ANC at the time . . . for me it was just like a normal day's work. I was a warrior. The world must recognise me as a freedom fighter and not make me out to be a cold-blooded murderer.'

Explaining the political rationale behind his act, he said: 'It is only by expanding the white race that we can counter the numerical dominance of blacks. I did not murder out of hate for the enemy but out of love for my people. My victims were not necessarily innocent people. These are the people who today are trying to take over my country.'

At Mr Strydom's trial in 1989 the judge, who noted he had never encountered a more cold-blooded murderer, sentenced him to death after remarking he saw no hope of rehabilitation. A psychologist asked by the Strydom defence team at the time to examine their client said last week she was appalled at the decision to free him.

Describing him as paranoid 'in the psychotic sense', Irma Labuschagne of the University of South Africa told the Johannesburg Weekly Mail: 'I am really afraid because I don't think he is a safe person out of prison. I would never trust him.'

The minister in charge of prisons, Adriaan Vlok, explained last week that the government had released Mr Strydom because he fell under the guidelines established for political prisoners. His release had been motivated by the desire to seek 'national reconciliation', Mr Vlok said.

The government's thinking was that, having agreed to release ANC murderer Robert McBride, in the interests of fairness they should release Mr Strydom.

In an editorial, the Weekly Mail said that to draw an analogy between Mr McBride and Mr Strydom was like suggesting that the French Resistance fighters should have been in the Nuremberg dock alongside the Nazis.