(Thumbnail image: The Daily Maverick)

On this day in 1960, South African police shot to death 69 people who were protesting the legal racial separation of the country's apartheid laws. And while South Africans pause to remember the Sharpeville massacre--many say the ruling African National Congress continues to ignore the plight of the poor.

Euronews correspondents in South Africa spoke with witnesses at a commemoration ceremony, reflecting on what happened 50 years ago.

"Eyewitnesses described how the police fired indiscriminately at men, women and children as they ran away. Many were shot in the back. Those 15 minutes became a turning-point in the struggle against apartheid."

But an opinion piece in South Africa's The Times suggests South African politicians--and the world--haven't learned from the massacre.

"... But what is urgently significant about Sharpeville is - in what some may call a contradiction in terms - the tragic and precise insignificance that is rapidly being attached to the memory of this place."

And despite the brutality of the shootings--the BBC reports survivors at the commemoration are practicing forgiveness.

"When time goes, when we lay the wreath, I just say sleep well. We will always remember you. Then from today, we will never cry again. We forgive those who done that to you, but we never forget."