The opposition yesterday accused Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s regime of stepping up a crackdown by arresting its leader’s lawyer ahead of a key summit on the country’s post-election crisis.
Innocent Chagonda was arrested on Thursday for simply demanding the release of a helicopter hired by opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai for his presidential campaign, the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and another lawyer said.
The helicopter had been confiscated by police and the pilot, a South African national, was detained on March 25 for alleged fraud and immigration transgressions. He spent nine days behind bars before being freed.
“As a party we feel this is a sustained effort on the part of the authorities against people who assist the MDC,” spokesman Nelson Chamisa said.
“This is an onslaught which is not only happening in the rural areas, but even in the civil service as people who are perceived MDC supporters are being intimidated,” he said.
Zimbabwe is still awaiting the result of the presidential election on March 29. Tsvangirai claims outright victory, but Mugabe’s ruling Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) says there must be a run-off.
The opposition on Thursday ruled out Tsvangirai’s participation in any second-round vote, accusing Mugabe and his regime of having launched a campaign of intimidation that would effect the true democratic result.
Zimbabwe Information Minister Bright Matonga yesterday shot down the opposition claims.
“There was no violence before the election, during the election or after the election so we can’t talk about even a military junta or anything,” he said.
Meanwhile, Mugabe and Tsvangirai prepared to lock horns at a weekend summit of southern African leaders aimed at sorting out Zimbabwe’s election mess.
Regional leaders were converging on the Zambian capital Lusaka for today’s extraordinary summit of the 14-nation Southern African Development Community to consider the crisis.
Tsvangirai met on Thursday in Pretoria with South African President Thabo Mbeki, officials said. Mbeki has come under fire for failing to condemn the long delay in announcing the presidential poll result.
Right-wing political scientist Laura Fernandez on Sunday won Costa Rica’s presidential election by a landslide, after promising to crack down on rising violence linked to the cocaine trade. Fernandez’s nearest rival, economist Alvaro Ramos, conceded defeat as results showed the ruling party far exceeding the threshold of 40 percent needed to avoid a runoff. With 94 percent of polling stations counted, the political heir of outgoing Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves had captured 48.3 percent of the vote compared with Ramos’ 33.4 percent, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal said. As soon as the first results were announced, members of Fernandez’s Sovereign People’s Party
EMERGING FIELDS: The Chinese president said that the two countries would explore cooperation in green technology, the digital economy and artificial intelligence Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday called for an “equal and orderly multipolar world” in the face of “unilateral bullying,” in an apparent jab at the US. Xi was speaking during talks in Beijing with Uruguayan President Yamandu Orsi, the first South American leader to visit China since US special forces captured then-Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro last month — an operation that Beijing condemned as a violation of sovereignty. Orsi follows a slew of leaders to have visited China seeking to boost ties with the world’s second-largest economy to hedge against US President Donald Trump’s increasingly unpredictable administration. “The international situation is fraught
MORE RESPONSIBILITY: Draftees would be expected to fight alongside professional soldiers, likely requiring the transformation of some training brigades into combat units The armed forces are to start incorporating new conscripts into combined arms brigades this year to enhance combat readiness, the Executive Yuan’s latest policy report said. The new policy would affect Taiwanese men entering the military for their compulsory service, which was extended to one year under reforms by then-president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in 2022. The conscripts would be trained to operate machine guns, uncrewed aerial vehicles, anti-tank guided missile launchers and Stinger air defense systems, the report said, adding that the basic training would be lengthened to eight weeks. After basic training, conscripts would be sorted into infantry battalions that would take
GROWING AMBITIONS: The scale and tempo of the operations show that the Strait has become the core theater for China to expand its security interests, the report said Chinese military aircraft incursions around Taiwan have surged nearly 15-fold over the past five years, according to a report released yesterday by the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Department of China Affairs. Sorties in the Taiwan Strait were previously irregular, totaling 380 in 2020, but have since evolved into routine operations, the report showed. “This demonstrates that the Taiwan Strait has become both the starting point and testing ground for Beijing’s expansionist ambitions,” it said. Driven by military expansionism, China is systematically pursuing actions aimed at altering the regional “status quo,” the department said, adding that Taiwan represents the most critical link in China’s
RSS