LONDON, Jan 30: Eight Commonwealth foreign ministers here on Wednesday decided against recommending Zimbabwe’s suspension from the organization over President Robert Mugabe’s crackdown on opposition ahead of March elections.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw had pressed a meeting of the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG), the organization’s democracy watchdog, to recommend that Zimbabwe should be temporarily ejected.
The action group told a press conference that it called on Zimbabwe’s government to prevent police and army involvement in politics, to allow free electoral campaigning and end press restrictions ahead of the March 9-10 presidential vote.
But the foreign ministers stopped short of recommending a suspension.
This will now be discussed at a meeting of the ministerial action group on the eve of a Commonwealth summit in Australia set for March 2-5 involving heads of state and government, who alone have the power to suspend a state.
“The overall result is less than we hoped for but more than we expected,” Straw told reporters after the meeting.
Commonwealth Secretary General Don McKinnon expressed concern at Mugabe’s treatment of the media and his opponents in the run-up to the elections.
In a communique, McKinnon said if the ministerial group had taken the “easy option” of suspending Zimbabwe six to 12 months ago, it would now have no leverage over Mugabe.
The foreign ministers also called for the “immediate deployment” of international observers to the presidential vote and for the “full cooperation” of the government of Zimbabwe in this.
Straw added: “What we have done today is to set down the most concrete benchmarks by which the conditions in which the elections in Zimbabwe are able to take place, with an overriding imperative — even at this late stage — of trying to secure as free and fair elections as is possible.”
He said the matter would be discussed again by Commonwealth ministers on March 1, before the Zimbabwe election, when they would be able to consider a range of options from simple disapproval to a suspension.
Zimbabwe’s opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is expected to mount the strongest challenge yet to Mugabe, who has ruled for 22 years, and his Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party.
Australia and Canada were thought to have offered support for Britain’s move to suspend Zimbabwe, while African and Asian countries were reported to be less willing.
Along with Straw, the foreign ministers of Australia, Bangladesh, Barbados, Botswana, Canada, Malaysia and Nigeria took part in Wednesday’s meeting.
journalists arrested: Police arrested three local journalists on Wednesday as the ruling party tried to speed passage of a tough media bill criticised for giving “frightening powers” to curb a free press.—Reuters