President George W. Bush sits with US Ambassador to the United Nations Zalmay Khalilzad (R) during a meeting of UN Security Council permanent representatives at the White House in Washington, June 25, 2008.
President Bush: We've had a really good discussion. We talked about a U.N. Security Council role for Darfur and Burma …And then we talked about Zimbabwe. Friday's elections, you know, appear to be a sham. You can't have free elections if a candidate is not allowed to campaign freely and his supporters aren't allowed to campaign without fear and intimidation. Yet the Mugabe government has been intimidating the people on the ground in Zimbabwe. And this is an incredibly sad development …
I want to thank very much the leaders in the region, those who have stepped up and spoke clearly, I appreciate them doing every -- taking their responsibility seriously. And I want to thank the members here around the table of the United Nations Security Council for your strong presidential statement. It was a powerful statement for fairness and decency and human dignity. And I suspect you'll still be dealing with this issue. And as you do, I hope you continue to speak with the same clarity that you spoke with last Monday.
People of Zimbabwe deserve better than what they're receiving now. People there want to express themselves at the ballot box, yet the Mugabe government has refused to allow them to do so. This is not just, and it is wrong.