South African Agents
01 January 1993
In February 1992, a lawyer named Bheki Mlangeni was killed by a parcel bomb intended for Dirk Coetzee, the former South African police officer who defected to the ANC, revealing what he knew about the operation of death squads in South Africa. At Mlangeni's inquest, secret South African Defence Force documents were produced, showing that two South African agents had met with RUC personnel over various matters. South African intelligence Captain Pamela du Randt had visited Northern Ireland and met with a member of the RUC.
They had discussed a plan to establish a link between the IRA and ANC in an attempt to discredit the latter. The second agent, Leon Flores, helped du Randt to establish surveillance of Coetzee, with a view to assassinating him in London. Members of the RUC allegedly carried out this surveillance. It may be however that the men involved were members of loyalist paramilitary groups. Flores and du Randt were arrested at Heathrow on 15 April and later deported following a tip off that they were plotting with loyalists to kill Coetzee. The RUC dismissed the allegations of their involvement with South African agents as "an excellent plot for a novel. There is no evidence to substantiate these far-fetched claims."