Zimbabwe Government to Benefit from Ivory Sales, China to purchase Ivory

Catherine Brahic, online environment reporter for the NewScientist Blog, reports today that Zimbabwe, along with other Southern African nations, will be permitted to sell a portion of its Ivory stockpile to China.



Brahic asks if the overseeing body, the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), has even considered whether or not Zimbabwe's government should be able to directly profit from the sales. CITES defense at the moment is that "All profits generated by the sale need to be put towards elephant conservation or community development projects." How does CITES realistically think this is possible in the current political climate in Zimbabwe?

UN Security Council Draft Resolution to Meet Opposition, Names Mugabe and Associates

Daniel Howden of the Independent [UK] reports today that a draft UN resolution calling for tougher sanctions against Mugabe and his close associates will likely run into opposition in the Security Council not only from China, South Africa, and Russia, but also Burkina Faso, the other African nation currently with a vote on the council.

Howden writes:

"A pitched battle has been under way since Tuesday at the UN Security Council as the United States and Britain sought to force a showdown over Zimbabwe. South Africa has been holding the line at the 15-nation council against measures including an international arms embargo, as well as travel bans and asset freezes targeting each of the 14 named individuals.

It was unclear whether London and Washington had the votes to win the battle as one British diplomat close to the effort said it was "touch and go whether we get them". The uncertainty was added to by the Russian President, Dmitry Medvedev, who went half way to meeting the West's demands in Japan by signing up to the G8 statement promising to punish the culprits in Zimbabwe, but then stopped short of supporting UN sanctions.

In an unlikely twist, the West African nation of Burkina Faso has found itself in the diplomatic spotlight. The second poorest country in the world, it has a UN vote as a temporary member of the council and has so far resisted pressure to back sanctions. Zimbabwe's Foreign Minister, Simbarashe Mumbengegwi, was in Burkina yesterday lobbying against a UN vote.

Mr Mugabe's inner circle, named in the draft resolution, has each amassed personal fortunes while overseeing the steepest collapse of a peacetime economy ever recorded. The draft resolution accuses them of "undermining the democratic process" and having "ordered, planned, or participated in" the campaign of political terror that has killed more than 100 people, displaced 200,000 and made the country an international pariah."

Howden also lists the 13 associates of Mugabe listed in the draft Security Council Resolution.

As Negotiations Seem to be in the works, Russia backs off from Support of UN Sanctions

Donna Bryson of the Associated Press reports today that the MDC and ZANU-PF have agreed to begin negotiating in South Africa today. The news broke as Tendai Biti's lawyer successfully obtained Biti's passport from the government so that he could go to South Africa to start talks. Prior to the June 27 run-off election, Biti was jailed on treason charges.


The same report suggests that Russia has backed away from their reported support at the G8 summit of tougher sanctions on Mugabe and his generals. Donna Bryson reports:

"Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Wednesday that a strong statement by the Group of Eight nations on Zimbabwe will not necessarily lead to sanctions over Robert Mugabe's widely criticized re-election.

Medvedev's statement indicated Russia could veto or abstain in a U.N. Security Council vote expected this week on a U.S. draft resolution calling for sanctions over state-supported election violence in Zimbabwe. Violence and intimidation there prompted the opposition candidate to pull out of the race with Mugabe."

Meanwhile, ZANU-PF is lobbying Burkina Faso, the African nation currently with a vote on the Security Council.

Bryson reports:

"Zimbabwe's Foreign Minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi met Tuesday in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, with the West African nation's President Blaise Compaore. Burkina Faso is currently a member of the U.N. Security Council.

In Burkina Faso, Mumbengegwi reiterated statements from Mugabe that he was ready to form a unity government with members of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai's party. Zimbabwe may see at least talking about talks as a way to ward off sanctions, but Mumbengegwi made clear Mugabe envisioned a leading role for himself, something the opposition and Mugabe's critics in the West have rejected."

Bryson's analysis points to Mugabe's long history of "talking about talks" in order to ward off criticism. To date, South Africa has facilitated such a strategy. Will this be negotiations as usual? Or is there now sufficient urgency for both Mugabe's inner-circle and South Africa?

William Saidi on why Sanctions against Mugabe and Company will help, not hurt, Zimbabweans

Veteran Zimbabwean journalist Bill Saidi has recently written an editorial for Pambazuka News in favor of increased sanctions against Mugabe and his cronies. Saidi dispels the oft-repeated objection that sanctions will hurt "ordinary Zimbabweans" most. Saidi writes:

"Zimbabwe’s economy is in the proverbial doldrums, some of it totally unrelated to sanctions, but caused by malfeasance and maladministration. For instance, Mugabe himself has railed against his own cabinet ministers over the corruption involving the land reform programme. Some of them have two, three or even four farms, when he has decreed that they should have only one. Moreover, others have not developed these previously white-owned properties to their previous level of productivity, using them for speculative purposes, instead.

In insisting that the sanctions have hurt most ordinary, average-income earners, the government had hoped to persuade voters not to continue with their support for the opposition. The idea has been to paint them with the same brush as the West, which the government alleges launched its anti-Zimbabwe campaign after the land reform programme.

All this has failed to impress most voters, because, for a majority of workers, the luxuries accorded to cabinet ministers and the heads of parastatal companies are so lavish, they cannot imagine the country suffering any real pain from the sanctions – unless there is a political reason for making the workers the main targets and sufferers.

And since the opposition draws most of its support from the workers, that conclusion is not difficult for them to arrive at. Tsvangirai once said he believed if the South Africans imposed any kind of sanctions on Zimbabwe, they would have such a devastating impact on the economy Mugabe would soon rush to Mbeki on bended knees to beg him to reverse the decision, in return for anything he wanted – including the immediate re-opening of direct talks with the opposition."

The issue of whether or not South Africa will cooperate fully with Sanctions is a tough one. When a similar situation developed in the 1960s and 1970s, South Africa paid lip service to international sanctions against Ian Smith's Rhodesian Front government, but provided a lifeline of fuel and other goods to the regime. In addition, the United States continued to buy chromium from Southern Rhodesia well into the 1970s. The same will likely occur with platinum mining today. It is one thing to freeze overseas assets and send the children of Zimbabwean military leaders away from universities in Australia. Quite another to stop mining platinum and denying the leadership large payouts from the mining concerns.

Saidi's article covers more topics than sanctions, and should be read in full.

G8 Leaders Agree on tougher Sanctions Against Mugabe and Associate

Thabo Mbeki's diplomatic efforts at the G8 Summit in Japan were less successful as his work at the AU summit last week in Egypt. As Larry Elliot and Patrick Wintour report for the Guardian [UK], British PM Gordon Brown used a graphic photo of the charred body of MDC activist Joshua Bakacheza to get the point across to the other leaders that it was time to take a tough stance against Mugabe.

Elliot and Wintour report:

"

The backing for Britain's tough stance came after Brown handed photographs of the charred body of Joshua Bakacheza, a member of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, to G8 and African leaders at the talks in Hokkaido.

A Downing Street source said: "Joshua is just one of the many innocent people murdered by Mugabe's thugs in recent weeks, but by highlighting the way he was brutally murdered while helping a widow and her children, the prime minister was telling other world leaders that this is a tragedy which is going on right now as they sit talking, and every day we wait to act, more innocent people will suffer."

Bakacheza was stopped on June 25 by three unmarked trucks, then seized by 16 men armed with AK-47 rifles. He and his companion, the widow of a murdered MDC activist, were taken to a farm. He was questioned on his involvement in the MDC then shot three times. His body was found three days later. Another MDC activist, Tendai Chidziwo, was also shot but survived.

The G8 decision brings Russia into agreement for UN action against the Mugabe regime, and rules out the possibility that Moscow will use its veto to block action at the security council in New York in the next few days.

If agreed, sanctions would be imposed worldwide on Mugabe and 11 other Zimbabwean government officials, leading to the freezing of their overseas assets and a ban on their travelling abroad."

Now the sanctions debate moves to back to New York and the UN. If Russia is now allegedly supportive of the idea, how will China vote? The idea of gaining access to Zimbabwe's platinum will have to be weighed against any fallout a month before the Olympics begin in Beijing.

Political Killings Continue After Elections--

Jan Raath reporting from Harare today provides evidence of continued killings and beatings by ZANU-PF thugs. The targets have been those MDC supporters who had asked for protection from the South African embassy and had been moved to an abandoned military base in Ruwa, outside of Harare. The camp was invaded by men with rifles and clubs early in the morning and people sleeping in the old squash courts were beaten.

Raath reports:

"Up to 20 masked men, armed with shotguns and knives, burst into the Ruwa rehabilitation centre east of Harare, clubbing men, women and children with gun butts as they slept in the squash courts of the old military base.

At the same time, another armed gang invaded a camp at Gokwe, north of Harare, where other families targeted in the state-sponsored violence had been sheltering."

...

"The opposition Movement for Democratic Change, the key targets of the state-sponsored campaign, reported yesterday that the violence was far from over, with at least 20 killings since the election, bringing the death toll to 109 since March."

All of this while world leaders explore diplomatic pressures and while Thabo Mbeki and the South African government continue to run interference against any concerted attempts at stronger sanctions against Mugabe and his inner circle. Botswana has been outspoken in its criticism of Mugabe, and now there are reports of military exercises along the Zimbabwean border by Botswana's forces. The alignment of SADC countries for and against Mugabe has more potential for future conflict than one might at first assume. The strong ties between Mugabe and the Namibian military, as well as the Angolan military--as all three profited from their ventures defending Kabila in the DRC--stands in contrast to the current opposition to Mugabe from Botswana and Zambia. The big power in the region, South Africa, still seems firmly in support of Mugabe, but as events at the G8 summit in Japan have shown, the ability of South Africa to speak for all of Sub-Saharan Africa in regards to debt relief and increased investment and aid from the G8 is hampered by Mbeki's support of Mugabe. The next South African president may not continue down this path.

Peta Thornycroft, reporting about the attacks on Monday for the Telegraph, quotes one of the refugees at the camp after the attack:

""The screaming and the noise of what they were doing was terrible, I don't even know how many were hurt, I couldn't see," said a 45-year-old man who escaped from the camp.

He believes scores of people were injured and many, including women and their infants, were kidnapped or fled into the bush to escape.

Most of the group are from rural areas who first sought protection at the MDC's Harvest House headquarters in Harare, but after it was raided by police several times moved to the position outside the embassy.

"We knew President (Thabo) Mbeki was mediating the situation and we thought they would help us," said the man.

"We moved to Ruwa because the South Africans told us we would be safe, but we are not safe.""

At what point does the "responsibility to protect" fall on the shoulders of the South African government. Are they not the ones most adamant that this must be solved locally? To what extent is the political violence in Zimbabwe beginning to parallel that of the Sudanese government both in the Southern Sudan and more recently in Darfur? South Africa needs to take a more active role in protecting Zimbabweans from ZANU-PF violence, and if they are not capable of doing so, they should be active in calling on an international peacekeeping force to provide some sort of buffer between those already identified as MDC or alleged MDC who are on the receiving end of the violence. How can the MDC negotiate with Mugabe, as the South Africans wish, while their supporters are murdered and beaten with impunity? This does not seem to be anywhere near the situation in Kenya when Odinga's supporters were quite capable of inflicting a great deal of violence and it became mixed with ethnic political violence in places like Nyakuru. Zimbabwe cannot be viewed as a similar situation where a government of national unity can suddenly appear. What leverage does the MDC have in such a negotiation? It is only the nations in the region and the AU who can provide the MDC legitimacy. Some have spoken out bravely, but the majority are willing to accept Mugabe's political violence and sham election as business as usual.

Liberian President Johnson Sirleaf Speaks out Against Mugabe's sham election at AU Summit in Egypt.

A press release from the Liberian government outlines President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf call "on the African Union to pronounce the June 27th elections in Zimbabwe as not credible and declare the results unacceptable, if the Union is to maintain its credibility."

"The President spoke today during the 13th Ordinary Session of the African Union (AU) in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, when she made her intervention to colleagues during a closed session. She said the international community should work with the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to find a permanent solution to the situation in Zimbabwe. She put forward Liberia as a case in point, saying the 1985 election was endorsed by Africa and the world, which frustrated the true will of the people of Liberia and subsequently engendered a fourteen year civil war that left over two hundred thousand persons dead. The Liberian leader called on the African Union to be courageous to say that ‘all is not well in Zimbabwe’ and that the request by SADC for a postponement of the June 27 Zimbabwean elections should be heeded. "

"The President reminded Summit participants that the African Union Observer Mission declared the June 27th elections fell short of the accepted AU standards, and that this was a similar position taken by the Pan African Parliament and the United Nations Security Council. She urged Summit participants to take a firm stance as well: ‘All these persons and institutions cannot be wrong, cannot be conspiratorial as we may be made to believe,’ she stressed. President Johnson Sirleaf also emphasized that the call for a peacekeeping mission in Zimbabwe is not realistic, adding that it may be necessary for SADC, in concert with the African Union Peace and Security Council, to put in place some civilian peace monitors who might constitute an early warning system in order to monitor and prevent further escalation of the crisis. She finally called on the AU be consistent with the standards it promotes."

Important points raised by Sirleaf Johnson. In particular the comparison to the sham elections in Liberia in 1985 that legitimated Samuel Doe's presidency (with the full support of the United States at the time), and this was followed by 17 years of civil war in Liberia. One only hopes war will be avoided in the Zimbabwean case.

Another important point is that both the AU observers and the Pan African Parliament observers have reported back to say that the elections were not up to AU or international standards of fairness. Shouldn't that have been sufficient grounds for the AU summit to show Mugabe the door? Apparently the number of AU presidents who have been elected in less than legitimate ways outnumber those who have had fair elections. "Democracy" and "human rights" have been concepts to manipulate in the past, during the Cold War, during the Structural Adjustment period of the mid 1990s, and in recent times, but unfortunately this lowest common denominator mentality works to protect the worst offenders.

President Sirleaf Johnson deserves praise for her role as Africa's first elected female president. She consistently shows her abilities both in Liberia and in the AU. If only more of her counterparts in other AU nations had as much 'guts' as she does.