Hundreds of people, including senior members of South Africa's ruling ANC, attended the reburial on Sunday of youth activists allegedly killed by the apartheid regime 22 years ago, an official said.

The 10 youth activists were deceived by apartheid security police into believing they were to join the UmKhonto we Sizwe (MK), the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC), and undergo military training, a spokesperson of the MK Military Veterans Association (MKMVA), Kebby Maphatsoe, told AFP.

"They were injected with a chemical to make them unconscious...placed in a minibus with a limpet mine and an AK 47...the minibus was set alight" and they were burnt beyond recognition, the group said in a statement.

The graves of the youths, famously called "the Mamelodi 10", were later found and their bodies excavated, it said.

Their families agreed to their reburial.

They were all reburied in Mamelodi, east of Pretoria, after a church service, Maphatsoe said.

AFP