Bush signed a proclamation that suspends U.S. entry privileges for Mugabe, his family or senior members of Mugabe's government. He also denied entry to those who received "significant financial benefit" from dealings with Zimbabwean officials who carried out Mugabe's policies.
The suspension is effective immediately, Bush said, and would be terminated at the discretion of Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Diamonds coming from war-torn countries like the DRC, Sierra Leone and Angola should have letters of certification from those governments. Diamond traders must also have permits from governments where gemstones originate.
……….. Subsequent meetings with government officials revealed their involvement in the illegal diamond trade with uncut stones being flown to South Africa where they were cut and fake documentation obtained to facilitate export to Europe.
…………. "Codrington explained that the financial transaction would take place with the aid of the security consulting firm Dickens & Madson," said Marsischky.
"He said they would designate accounts that we would transfer money to and when receipt by electronic transfer or letter of credit was confirmed, the diamonds would be released to us in the designated country such as South Africa. [End Excerpt]
_______THE PRICE: Government propaganda blitz on Mugabe assasination plot --[Excerpt] Dambiti, huddled with friends over a copy of the state-run Herald newspaper during their lunch break, said reports of the plot made him wonder if Tsvangirai was trustworthy.
But his friends said they didn't believe the claims given all-out coverage by the state media since they were first broadcast by an Australian television station a week ago.
Andrew Moyse, head of the independent Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe, said poor Zimbabweans - 70 percent of the population live below the poverty line - mostly have access only to the dominant state controlled media.
"There is proof of the old adage that if you reproduce propaganda long enough people will begin to believe it, irrespective of whether they believed it in the beginning," Moyse said.
The Canadian firm Dickens and Madson said last week that it secretly videotaped a meeting on Dec. 4 in its Montreal offices with Tsvangirai in which he allegedly asked for help to kill or overthrow Mugabe.
The Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation has repeatedly run the grainy footage. State newspapers have given prominence to the claims every day.
Information Minister Jonathan Moyo suggested Britain, the former colonial power, and several member nations of the European Union were trying to hide their role in the alleged assassination plot. [End Excerpt]
__________THE STING: [Excerpt] In a statement Thursday, Tsvangirai [Zimbabwe opposition leader] denied Dickens and Madson's claims the opposition approached the firm to assassinate Mugabe.
He said the firm used a former Zimbabwean based in South Africa to present an offer to improve the opposition's image abroad. Four meetings were held with the firm.
"At no stage during the first three meetings was the issue of elimination or assassination ever discussed," Tsvangirai said.
The meetings focused on the need "to bridge the communications gap abroad."
At the fourth meeting, secretly filmed in Montreal, Ben-Menashe and his team "raised the issue of elimination and kept on asking strange questions."
Tsvangirai said he became suspicious of the firm's motives and walked out. The opposition later found out Ben-Menashe had been hired by top Zimbabwean officials "to set up the MDC," he said.
Ben-Menashe said Wednesday that at two meetings in London Tsvangirai raised the subject of assassinating Mugabe and arranging a coup d'etat.
Ben-Menashe said he had an audio tape of one of those meetings, but refused to allow a reporter from The Associated Press to listen to it.
The surveillance tape, aired Wednesday on SBS television's "Dateline" program, showed an aerial view of four men sitting around a boardroom table. The black-and-white picture was grainy and the faces of the men - including the one identified as Tsvangirai - were largely obscured.
"The MDC, represented by the top man who's sitting here right now, commits to ... the coup d'etat or the elimination of the president," Ben-Menashe said on the tape.
During the meeting, the man identified as Tsvangirai expressed concern the military might take over if Mugabe was "eliminated."
Ben-Menashe on Wednesday denied accusations his firm had framed Tsvangirai. [End Excerpt]
=====Who is Ari Ben-Menashe? This is what Media Research Center found out--[Excerpt] BEN-MENASHE. Ari Ben-Menashe appeared three times in the first show, highlighted as an Israeli intelligence officer. PBS reported that "Israeli intelligence officer Ari Ben-Menashe says he was one of half a dozen Israelis sent to Paris at Casey's request to help coordinate arms deliveries" and "Israeli intelligence officer Ari Ben-Menashe claimed that he saw intelligence reports about Casey's trip to Madrid." After Newsweek and The New Republic published their exposés of the sources pushing the October Surprise story, including the fact that Ben-Menashe's wife called him a liar, Frontline's second program admitted: "His credibility with reporters collapsed because some of his assertions proved implausible, particularly his claim about George Bush."
THE HASHEMIS. While Frontline disavowed Brenneke and Ben-Menashe, the producers stood by their belief in the Hashemi brothers, Jamshid and Cyrus, a pair of Iranian arms dealers. This despite the New Republic exposé, which declared Jamshid Hashemi had "even worse credibility problems" than Brenneke and Ben-Menashe; and the Village Voice placed Cyrus as flying from Paris instead of to Paris on August 14, when the meetings supposedly took place. [End Excerpt]
Tsvangirai video evidence 'doctored'--[Excerpt] THE surveillance video footage which purportedly shows Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader Morgan Tsvangirai plotting to assassinate President Robert Mugabe has been extensively "doctored", evidence made available to the Zimbabwe Independent this week shows.
Media Monitoring Project of Zimbabwe (MMPZ) director Andrew Moyse said the video footage shown last week by Australia's Special Services Broadcasting (SBS) station was tampered with.
Moyse said a common cut-and-paste editing method was used.
"Notably, what Tsvangirai was heard to say did not match the titles on the screen," he said……………………….. Davis said Dickens & Madson's chief executive Ari Ben-Menashe, a former Israeli intelligence operative who has been involved in a series of questionable dealings, opened the meeting. [End Excerpt]
_________THE PURPOSE: "The opposition said the story was part of an ongoing government smear campaign intended to distract people from the important issues of joblessness, AIDS and food shortages.
The Zimbabwean government did not immediately comment on the accusation. Under security laws passed last month acts of "insurgency, banditry, sabotage or terrorism" carry a penalty of life imprisonment.…" AP LINK