Posted on 07/24/2002 3:53:47 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe's government has condemned the European Union for extending sanctions against President Robert Mugabe's officials, but vowed the move would not stop its controversial seizures of white-owned farms.
In statements quoted by the official Herald newspaper on Wednesday, Mugabe said he would never surrender on the issue, while his Information Minister Jonathan Moyo branded as a waste of time the sanctions slapped on by the EU earlier this week.
Moyo described as "crude" the EU's decision to add 52 more names to a list of 20 Zimbabwean leaders and officials banned from traveling to the EU.
He said the visa and asset freezes against Zimbabwe's ruling elite and some prominent supporters of the ruling ZANU-PF party was part of a drive by former colonial power Britain to derail the redistribution of white-owned farms to landless blacks.
"Instead of paying attention to issues concerning the welfare of the majority of Zimbabweans, they are using the most uncivilized and crude way to support their kith and kin who are the white commercial farmers claiming to be Zimbabweans," he said.
"It is obvious that the EU is trying to do everything possible to derail the land redistribution program which we have to finalize by August 31," he added.
Moyo also accused the Western media of siding with the main opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) and lying to the world about the situation in Zimbabwe over human rights abuses and political violence.
Britain was working to protect the interests of minority whites in Zimbabwe and not the welfare of both blacks and whites, he charged.
"It is clear that the Western media is trying to fool the world about the situation in Zimbabwe," he said.
MUGABE SAYS WON'T YIELD GROUND
The Herald also quoted Mugabe as telling his officials at a party to mark the official opening of parliament on Tuesday that he would never yield ground on the issue of land.
It quoted the 78-year-old, who has regularly attacked British Prime Minister Tony Blair over the past two years, as saying that "Blair, that young man" was wasting his time with sanctions against his government over its land policies.
"The land belongs to us, we fought for it, we died for it and we shall continue to fight and die for it," he said.
"But somehow this young fellow thinks no, if he piles sanctions on we will surrender. Nobody has taught him that we don't know the word surrender in relation to our rights. That word we can't spell, it's not in our dictionary," Mugabe said.
British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said on Monday that sanctions against Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe and his top aides were working to isolate them on the world stage.
The EU imposed so-called "smart sanctions" against Mugabe's government in February ahead of a March presidential poll he went on to win amid widespread allegations of election malpractice.
The sanctions included a ban on the sale and supply of arms and of equipment which could be used for internal repression.
The extension of the EU sanctions came as nearly 2,900 farmers in Zimbabwe face a government deadline to leave their land by mid August.
The opposition MDC welcomed the sanctions, saying the move showed the international community was determined to hold Mugabe to book on issues of democracy and human rights abuses.
Outside the southern African state's parliament, there was no sign of a planned protest march by pro-democracy activists after police warnings that the demonstration would be crushed. Mugabe said Zimbabwe, in the grips of its worst economic and political crisis since independence from Britain in 1980, was facing "considerable challenges" from what he called "British machinations" and a regional drought.
The economy is in its fourth year of recession with record high inflation and unemployment and a severe food shortage. "Our sovereignty is constantly under attack from the bullying states ... which seek to use their political and economic prowess to achieve global hegemony," Mugabe said. At 78, Mugabe is a left-winger who counts Cuba's Fidel Castro and Libya's Muammar Gaddafi among his foreign allies. Monday, the European Union extended a blacklist of Zimbabwean officials subjected to a visa ban and asset freeze. The move is aimed at piling more pressure on the country whose human rights record it says has deteriorated since Mugabe's re-election in March. ***
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