Kofi Annan calls for Africa to take the lead in condemning Mugabe and dealing with the problem of Zimbabwe. He said:

Yes. Zimbabwe is an international issue. But there is no way that the rest of the world - and especially Britain - can get involved beyond the occasional statement of regret at the current situation until Africa asks for help.

It is up to Africa to ask for help over Zimbabwe. It is up to Africa to make the first move against Mugabe's dictatorship. Until the African leaders and people have the desire, the international community can do nothing - as otherwise they will face the inevitable accusation of a new colonialism. Zimbabwe may not be a problem that Africa alone can fix, but no-one else can do anything to help until Africa asks for it.

That Kofi Annan is saying things like this, and that the UN is to have talks with African leaders over dealing with Zimbabwe, is a very welcome development. Hopefully it will all result in an end to the Mugabe dictatorship over the people of Zimbabwe.

I agree with Robert Mugabe*: Gordon Brown is "a little tiny dot on this world". But Robert Mugabe is an even tinier little dot on this world. And a reviled one at that.

But, really, how long does it take to count votes? It's been two weeks since the election was held, surely that is long enough to count and re-count the ballot paper several times!

So why does he now want to hold a recount? Just announce the results and accept that you have lost. Otherwise Zimbabwe will experience the same upheaval and issues that affected Kenya not so long ago, after the Kenyan president refused to accept that he had lost the election.

If Mugabe does not accept that he has lost the election immediately after this recount, there will be hell to pay. If he claims that he has won after the recount, there will be even worse hell to pay. It does not take that long to count votes, and the more Mugabe delays the worse it looks.

But I doubt he'll listen, since I'm an even smaller tiny dot than Mugabe himself.

* Only on the fact that Brown is a "a little tiny dot on this world," though . Just to clarify this.

Zimbabwe appears to be on the brink of finally getting rid of Mugabe and establishing proper democracy. At the very least, Mugabe's party has lost control of the parliament, but still has 94 of the 210 seats, with the main Opposition party only two ahead on 96. So it is hardly a crushing defeat for him - but a defeat nevertheless.

We can all hope that this result means that the end is nigh for the tyrant Mugabe. We can all hope that Zimbabwe can at last go down a democratic - and hopefully less economically destructive - route in to the future.

Mugabe should accept the defeat and step down. If he forces a Presidential run-off vote, he will almost certainly be humiliated. And if he doesn't, he will just end up with the same result as in Kenya - certainly not a good thing for anyone. But if he steps down now, he can ensure a better future for Zimbabwe and a less damning legacy of his own regime*.

This is an opportunity for Zimbabwe to move in a new, democratic, and brighter future. Let's hope that opportunity is grabbed with both hands.

* Less damning, but damning nevertheless.

Gordon is absolutely right to have boycotted the EU/Africa summit over the attendance of Robert Mugabe and his human rights violations. I said the same when this was first announced as possibility, and I haven't seen anything that could change my mind about it since.

If anything, in fact, I think that Brown is even more right than I thought before to boycott this, since it is being proclaimed as a "summit of equals". This just boosts Mugabe, something which the civilised world should not be doing.

It is certainly ironic that the EU, with all it's rules and proclaimed interest in human rights to back a man who is killing his own country. In fact, wasn't Mugabe supposedly banned from entering the EU due to his human rights violations? Isn't it nice how consistent they are.

Gordon Brown is absolutely right to boycott this summit over Mugabe. Just a pity he's so wrong about everything else...

UPDATE: It seems it isn't such a principled stand after all, since "pseudo minister" Baroness Amos has been sent to represent Britain. If Brown was really serious over this, he wouldn't have sent anyone.

The Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, writes in the Guardian about how "saving Zimbabwe is not colonialism, [but] Britain's duty":

Yes, Zimbabwe needs international intervention - but it is up to Africa to invite us in. Until they accept that Mugabe is "the worst kind of racist dictator" and has "enacted an awful Orwellian vision", there is nothing that can be done. As it is, Brown's refusal to even potentially have a "Straw moment" with Mugabe has led to African nations refusing to go to a summit, so how much worse a reaction would be received if he - or any other non-African nation - suggests direct intervention?

In this article, Sentamu has a weird argument with regards to colonialism, using it as a basis of both intervening and not intervening in Zimbabwe. He says that "saving Zimbabwe is not colonialism, [but] Britain's duty", that "the time has come for Mr Brown... to slay the ghosts of Britain's colonialist past by thoroughly revising foreign policy towards Zimbabwe and to lead the way in co-ordinating an international response" and also that "Britain needs to escape from its colonial guilt when it comes to Zimbabwe." All of these cannot be true. I don't think that Britain's colonialist history is anything to be ashamed of or to feel guilty for. To start with, it happened in a different time and culture, and we were by no means the worst perpetrators of the bad aspects. If anything, we should feel more guilty for ending colonialism in much of Africa when we did than for doing it in the first place.

When it comes down to it, I think that we do need into intervene in Zimbabwe, but in the current political climate, we can't until Africa - or at least much of Africa - asks for us to do so. Whilst they stand beside Mugabe and his dying Zimbabwe, there is nothing that the rest of the world can do. Zimbabwe may not be a problem that Africa alone can fix, but no-one else can do anything to help until Africa asks for it.

Source: The Guardian

Yes, this isn't the sort of post that I expected to write either. But for this stand, he deserves it. It's just a pity about almost everything else he says and does.

Brown is right to do this. Mugabe should be banned from any and all international summits, and at last Brown is making the right move. Even if it is mainly to ensure that he doesn't end up with a "Straw moment" and have to shake hands with Mugabe.

But the right move is the right move - even if it is dictated by spin.

Source: The Times

"Zimbabwe's beleaguered currency has lost half its value in three days, black market dealers said last night, prompting predictions that the country was plunging into an economic meltdown that its veteran leader Robert Mugabe would not survive.
According to the government in Harare, one US dollar is worth 250 Zimbabwean dollars. But the free market rate yesterday reached more than Z$300,000 to one US dollar...
John Makumbe, a senior lecturer in political science at the University of Zimbabwe, said: "It is the economy that is going to bring the regime down.
"I don't think it's very sustainable. Right now the transport sector is grinding to a halt. A lot of people are now in abject poverty. With a million dollars you will be lucky to buy two or three items."" (The Telegraph)

What more can I say? Zimbabwe is dying, and the world ignores it. The Zimbabwean people don't deserve to suffer like this. Something really does need to be done. Hopefylly Mugabe will get toppled by his own people, and Zimbabwe can try and come back from the devastating consequences of his incompetent and corrupt reign.

More people die every month in Zimbabwe than in either Darfur or Iraq. Rape, torture, and murder by government officials is commonplace. Mugabe has systematically destroyed the Zimbabwean economy by evicting white farmers and giving their farms to political friends, and once prosperous farms become desolate- and he wants to do the same to foreign-owned businesses. Zimbabwe has gone from the breadbasket of Africa, to a basket-case.

Yet will anyone help? Does anyone care? Over his decade as Prime Minister, Tony Blair has spent a lot of time on foreign policy with wars and intervention all over the world, most recently in Afghanistan and Iraq, and yet has done nothing about the abuses in Zimbabwe, where Mugabe is arguably as, if not more, oppressive than Saddam Hussein had been in Iraq.