"Mandela, president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, was on a US terror watch list until 2008."

Nelson Mandela: CIA tip-off led to 1962 Durban arrest - BBC News: "Nelson Mandela's arrest in 1962 came as a result of a tip-off from an agent of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), a report says. The revelations, made in the Sunday Times newspaper, are based on an interview with ex-CIA agent Donald Rickard shortly before he died. Mandela served 27 years in jail for resisting white minority rule before being released in 1990. He was subsequently elected as South Africa's first black president. Rickard, who died earlier this year, was never formally associated with the CIA but worked as a diplomat in South Africa before retiring in the late 70s.

Mandela, president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, was on a US terror watch list until 2008. Before that, along with other former ANC leaders, he was only able to visit the US with special permission from the secretary of state, because the ANC had been designated a terrorist organisation by the former apartheid government.  Mr Mandela needed special permission to enter the US until 2008 The bill scrapping the designation was introduced by Howard Berman, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, who promised to "wipe away" the "indignity". President Ronald Reagan had originally placed the ANC on the list in the 1980s."