44 ARRESTED IN APARTHEID PROTEST RALLY

'MARCH FOR CHILDREN' ENDS AT WHITE HOUSE

U.S. Park Police arrested 44 people outside the White House yesterday as a crowd estimated at more than 2,000 gathered to demonstrate against apartheid in South Africa.

All of those arrested were charged with demonstrating without a permit, a misdemeanor that carries a $50 fine if convicted, a U.S. Park Police spokeswoman said.

A Park Police spokesman said all of the demonstrators arrested had been released from the Park Police operations facility in Anacostia Park by late last night.

The demonstrators, who were taking part in a "March for the Children of South Africa," knelt in front of the White House gates and hung placards with the names of individuals who have been detained by police in that country, witnesses said.

Police said that more than 2,000 people took part in the march, which began at the Washington Monument and ended up spilling over into Lafayette Square across from the White House. Organizers of the event, which commemorated the 13th anniversary of the Soweto uprising, estimated the crowd size at twice that number.

On June 16, 1976, more than 575 black South Africans, many of them children, were killed during what was to have been a nonviolent march in the Soweto black township to protest the mandatory teaching of the Afrikaans language in black schools.

Black children in South Africa "don't have childhoods," Mpho Tutu, daughter of 1984 Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu, told the crowd yesterday. "They know death long before they are accustomed to life," added Tutu, who administers a scholarship fund in her father's name from New York City.

Demonstrators wore the names of South Africans who have been detained by police in their country and chanted "Free South Africa! Free the children now!" as they marched up 15th Street. The event culminated a monthlong series of activities nationwide -- including prayer vigils and speech tours by South African church leaders -- against apartheid, South Africa's system of racial separation.

The march, which was publicized largely through the 18-year-old national interfaith publication Sojourners, drew participants from as far away as Grand Rapids, Mich., and Memphis. Organizers estimated that at least 20 states, 24 religious denominations or groups and 16 human rights groups were represented.

On Friday, participants from several states descended on Capitol Hill to show their support for a comprehensive sanctions bill against South Africa that is pending before both houses of Congress, according to Damu Smith, organizer of the lobbying effort.

Current sanctions include a prohibition on new U.S. loans to South African businesses and its government, a ban on the import of certain items produced by South African government-controlled firms and a ban on the export to South Africa of crude oil, petroleum products, weapons and munitions.

President Bush, in a meeting last month with Archbishop Tutu, said he would use "pressure, influence and leverage" on the South African government to bring about change, but did not support additional economic sanctions against the Pretoria government because he said he thought it would hurt the black majority.

"I hope this march shows that South Africa is still an important issue," said the Rev. Allan Boesak, president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, "and still demands the concerted actions and sanctions that will leave the government no option but to negotiate" with black South Africans.

"They knew what they were doing," Boesak said of those arrested yesterday. "I think this again will be a powerful symbol."

"It has been proved that there is a groundswell that belies the administration," said Boesak, gesturing to the crowd. "It shows that ordinary churchgoing people not only care, but want to see an end to apartheid."

"I hope this spurs that man, George Bush, into listening," said Naomi Huntley, a sixth-grade teacher from Newark who came with about 40 church members from the St. James African Methodist Episcopal Church. "I hope it spurs him into paying attention to the people of the United States."

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