South Africa has named Roelf Meyer, a 78-year-old former minister who helped negotiate the end of apartheid in the 1990s, as its next ambassador to the United States. Meyer will fill a post that has been vacant since March 2025, when President Donald Trump expelled Ambassador Ebrahim Rasool after Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused him of being a "race-baiting politician" hostile to the administration. The appointment is widely seen as Pretoria's attempt to repair strained ties with Washington, which have been tested by disputes over South Africa's Gaza genocide case at the International Court of Justice, a contentious land-reform law, and Trump's decision to launch a refugee programme for white South Africans.