ties with the apartheid regime of South Africa, particularly with regards to matters pertaining to nuclear weapons. The Reagan administration developed constructive engagement with the South African government as a means of encouraging it to move away from apartheid gradually. It was part of a larger initiative designed to foster peaceful economic development and political change throughout southern Africa. This policy, however, engendered much public criticism, and renewed calls for the imposition of stringent sanctions. In response, Reagan announced the imposition of new sanctions on the South African government, including an arms embargo in late 1985. These sanctions were seen as weak by anti-apartheid activists and as insufficient by the president's opponents in Congress. In 1986, Congress approved the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act, which included tougher sanctions; Reagan's veto was overridden by Congress. Afterward, he remained opposed to apartheid and unsure of "how best to oppose it". Several European countries, as well as Japan, also imposed their sanctions on South Africa soon after. Libya bombing Relations between Libya and the United States under President Reagan were continually contentious, beginning with the 1981 Gulf of Sidra incident. By 1982, Muammar Gaddafi was considered by the Central Intelligence Agency to be, along with Leonid Brezhnev and Fidel Castro, part of a group known as the "unholy trinity" and was also labeled as "our international public enemy number one" by a CIA official. These tensions were later revived in early April 1986 when a bomb exploded in a Berlin discothèque, injuring 63 American military personnel and killing one serviceman. Stating that there was "irrefutable proof" that Libya had directed the "terrorist bombing", Reagan authorized the use of force against the country. In the late evening of April 15, 1986, the United States launched a series of airstrikes on ground targets in Libya. Thatcher allowed the United States Air Force to use Britain's air bases to launch the attack, on the justification that the United Kingdom was supporting America's right to self-defense under Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations. The attack was, according to Reagan, designed to halt Gaddafi's "ability to export terrorism", offering him "incentives and reasons to alter his criminal behavior". The attack was condemned by many countries; by an overwhelming vote, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution to condemn the attack and deem it a violation of the Charter and international law. Iran–Contra affair Reagan authorized William