Biden ‘separated’ - not arrested - while visiting Mandela

The campaign team for former US Vice-President Joe Biden has revised a claim that he was arrested in the 1970s while on his way to visit Nelson Mandela in prison. 

Mr Biden - who is seeking the Democratic Party nomination for the presidency - had previously said he was “proud” to have been “arrested in the streets of Soweto while trying to see him [Mandela] on Robben Island”, along with fellow US official Andrew Young. 

However, speaking to a reporter on Tuesday, Mr Biden’s deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield pared down the narrative.  

“It was a separation... He was not allowed to go through the same door that the rest of the party he was with. Obviously, it was apartheid South Africa. There was a white door, there was a black door”, she said.

She added, “He did not want to go through the white door and have the rest of the party go through the black door. He was separated. This was during a trip while they were there in Johannesburg”. 

Mr Biden’s version of events was initially disputed by the New York Times. Mr Young, who was the US ambassador to the United Nations from 1977 - 1979, also said the pair had not been arrested. 

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