The first issue to arise was in many ways the most crucial, and that was the armed struggle. We spent a number of months discussing it. They insisted that the ANC must renounce violence and give up the armed struggle before the government would agree to negotiations—and before I could meet President Botha. Their contention was that violence was nothing more than criminal behavior that could not be tolerated by the state. I responded that the state was responsible for the violence and that it is always the oppressor, not the oppressed, who dictates the form of the struggle.
