Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe invited opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai to his inauguration yesterday, before results of the election were in, while British Foreign Office Minister Mark Malloch Brown and Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu called for decisive action
Tsvangirai rejected the invitation, saying the inauguration was meaningless.
Desmond Tutu dismissed the election as a charade and called on leaders of the African Union (AU) to refuse to recognize Mugabe.
“I think that would be a very, very powerful signal,” he told the BBC, while calling for UN military intervention in Zimbabwe.
“A very good argument can be made for having an international force to restore peace” under UN auspices, Tutu said.
Meanwhile, Malloch Brown urged African countries yesterday to do “whatever it takes” to ensure Mugabe steps down.
“The fact is, if law and order breaks down in the country, or if Mugabe is utterly resistant to change and continues to oppress violently peoples’ human rights, then I hope the African neighbors will do whatever it takes to secure his departure,” he told the BBC.
“President Mugabe has to go [and] we’ve got to see what works in terms of ending this regime.”
On the upcoming AU summit in Egypt, Malloch Brown said he hoped that African nations would “unequivocally” tell Mugabe they cannot accept him.
Malloch Brown said that while Italy has proposed that all EU member states close their Harare embassies, Britain is reluctant to do so given the number of British nationals in Zimbabwe.
Mugabe’s spokesman, George Charamba, said yesterday the invitation to Tsvangirai was “done in the spirit of the president’s wish to reach out.”
Tsvangirai said the opposition was committed to AU sponsored talks with Mugabe’s government although no negotiations had started.
Although results have not been released, Mugabe said he was heading for victory in the poll. His swearing-in for a new five-year term was to be held at 3pm yesterday.
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