Donald Trump shockingly shows South African president video he claims is 'evidence of genocide' in his country

Donald Trump welcomed Cyril Ramaphosa to the White House yesterday, but he surprised everyone after showing his South African counterpart a video of the alleged 'genocide' in his country.

The US president rarely beats around the bush, and he certainly has history when it comes to 'ambushing' foreign leaders in the Oval Office, as we saw back in February when he and JD Vance had their explosive meeting with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Trump, who also announced plans for a new $175 billion golden dome as part of a revolutionary missile defence system, has always promised to be firm with other world leaders but after exchanging niceties with Ramaphosa yesterday (21 May), the 78-year-old dimmed the lights in the Oval Office so he could play a video which allegedly showed the graves of over 1,000 white farmers who have died in South Africa.

Trump remarked: "It's a terrible sight... I've never seen anything like it. Those people are all killed."

Cyril Ramaphosa met with Trump in the Oval Office (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Ramaphosa responded: "I'd like to know where that is because this... I've never seen."

The clips also showed South African officials calling for violence against white farmers, in scenes which the country has tried to distance itself from, ever since apartheid, and the racial segregation of people living in the country, ended just over 30 years ago.

During the meeting, Trump added: "We have many people that feel they're being persecuted, and they're coming to the United States. So we take from many... locations, if we feel there's persecution or genocide going on."

He added: "People are fleeing South Africa for their own safety. Their land is being confiscated and in many cases they're being killed."

Alluding to people in the clips, Mr Trump said: "These are people that are officials and they're saying... kill the white farmer and take their land."

Ramaphosa pushed back against Trump's accusations, by responding: "What you saw, the speeches that were being made, that is not government policy. We have a multi-party democracy in South Africa that allows people to express themselves, political parties to adhere to various policies.

"And in many cases, or in some cases, those policies do not go along with government policy.

"Our government policy is completely, completely against what he [a person in the video montage] was saying, even in the parliament. And they are a small minority party which is allowed to exist in terms of our constitution."

In a conference following the meeting, the 72-year-old suggested that his time with Trump had gone 'very well' and he once again reinforced his belief that 'there is no genocide in South Africa'.