Maputo  - The Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) was urged Tuesday to close ranks in order to address issues that sparked attacks against foreigners in South Africa last month.

"SADC needs to develop a common approach in order to tackle the root causes of the hatred attacks in South Africa", said human rights activist Graca Machel, wife of former South African President Nelson Mandela.

"The eruption of this violence is an outcry of the poor without solutions to the very needs to survive, and they resort to violence because they have no one else to blame, but their fellow poor neighbours", she told a regional conference in the Mozambique capital.

"So, there is a need to map out integrated and complementary actions to address the issues that sparked this violence", she stressed in her first remarks on the crisis that forced more than 60,000 people to flee South Africa.

The meeting was organized by the Souther Africa Trust and the Foundation for Community Development, which is chaired by Machel, widow of the late Mozambican President Samora Machel.

Organizers said the huge influx of immigrants from all over the African continent has seen rising hostility against foreigners who are blamed for crime and taking jobs away from locals. (dpa)