Posted on 07/06/2005 7:37:04 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
LONDON (Reuters) - United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Thursday African leaders must speak out against what he called the wrong policies of any governments on the continent.
Annan told the Financial Times in an interview it was vital for African countries to break their silence to protect the continent's credibility in the eyes of the world.
"What is important -- and what is lacking on the continent -- is (a willingness) to comment on wrong policies in a neighboring country," he said before attending a summit of the Group of Eight (G8) top industrialized nations in Scotland.
Annan did not name Zimbabwe in the interview, but a special representative of the U.N. secretary-general is assessing Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's demolition of shanty towns that human rights groups say has made 300,000 people homeless.
African leaders have been criticized for a reluctance to speak out against Mugabe.
"I've often tried to tell them they cannot continue to treat these situations as purely internal. It starts as internal but it becomes a regional problem," said Annan.
"Nobody invests in a bad neighborhood and if you have just one or two countries behaving that way, that hurts everybody."
A leading Zimbabwean churchman urged G8 leaders on Wednesday to make action by African states against Mugabe's government a precondition for more debt relief and aid.
"The international community has done little to prevent Mugabe's excesses and it is time to act," said a report co-authored by the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo, Pius Ncube.
On Tuesday, South African President Thabo Mbeki, criticized at home and abroad for so-called "soft diplomacy" on Zimbabwe, said he and Annan had agreed to wait for a report by Annan's envoy on the demolitions before deciding on a course of action.
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on July 6, 2005, African leaders must speak out against what he called the wrong policies of any governments on the continent. Annan speaks during opening session of a summit of the 53-nation African Union in Sirte, Libya July 4, 2005. (Radu Sigheti/Reuters)
So, is Kofi finally going to condemn liberofascist socialism?
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