Pretoria, South Africa - South Africa has denounced a "deeply flawed" US report highlighting its supposedly "deteriorating" human rights situation, days after Donald Trump's administration slapped 30% tariffs on many of the country's exports.

In its annual human rights report released Tuesday, the US State Department accused South Africa of taking "a substantially worrying step towards land expropriation of Afrikaners and further abuses against racial minorities."

Hit with the highest US tariffs of any sub-Saharan country, South Africa has been a regular target of Trump, who has criticized land and employment laws meant to redress deep ongoing racial injustices stemming from colonialism and apartheid.

Pretoria's foreign ministry responded Tuesday by expressing "profound disappointment" in the US report.

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"We find the report to be an inaccurate and deeply flawed account that fails to reflect the reality of our constitutional democracy," it said.

A law signed this year by President Cyril Ramaphosa and denounced by Trump allows for the expropriation of land without compensation in rare circumstances.

Land ownership remains a serious issue in South Africa, with most farmland still owned by white people three decades after the end of apartheid.

Trump has repeatedly made false claims of a "white genocide" in South Africa and stirred outrage by granting refugee status to white South Africans, even amid his mass detention and deportation campaign.

Pretoria still hopes to strike a deal with Washington, its third-largest trading partner, to save tens of thousands of jobs in the agricultural, automotive, and textiles sectors that are highly dependent on the US market.