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June 2009 vol 1, National News

EU re-engagement meeting threatened by ban on Mugabe man

By Staff reporter and agencies   Wed, Jun 17, 2009

Harare - The European Union's refusal to grant visas to ministers from Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's party to accompany Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai to Brussels this week has deepened rifts in Harare's coalition government, it emerged Tuesday. Tsvangirai is on a tour of the United States and several European countries to try to repair relations damaged during the past decade of Mugabe's autocratic rule and secure aid towards rebuilding Zimbabwe's battered economy.

EU re-engagement meeting threatened by ban on Mugabe man

Harare - The European Union's refusal to grant visas to ministers from Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's party to accompany Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai to Brussels this week has deepened rifts in Harare's coalition government, it emerged Tuesday. Tsvangirai is on a tour of the United States and several European countries to try to repair relations damaged during the past decade of Mugabe's autocratic rule and secure aid towards rebuilding Zimbabwe's battered economy.

 

After meeting last week with US President Barack Obama, the former opposition leader, who took his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) into coalition with Mugabe's Zanu-PF in February, is continuing his trip in Europe this week.

 

On Wednesday, he and six members of his cabinet, two from each of the three parties in the coalition government, are scheduled to meet senior EU officials in Brussels for what is being called a re-engagement meeting.

 

Three ministers, from each of Zanu-PF, the MDC and a breakaway MDC faction led by Arthur Mutambara, are accompanying him throughout the trip, with three more supposed to join the Brussels meeting.

 

From Zanu-PF, Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa was due to attend, but the EU is refusing him entry because Chinamasa is one of the scores of Zanu-PF members and allies, including Mugabe, barred from travelling to the EU and US under targeted sanctions going back years.

 

Sources in Zimbabwe's cabinet said Mugabe on Tuesday instructed that the trip should be aborted if Chinamasa was refused entry.

 

Industry Minister Welshman Ncube, a leading member of deputy prime minister Mutambara's MDC faction, told the German Press Agency

By Staff reporter and agencies

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Comments(1):

  1. Good Enough

    If the Mugabe regime requires the journalist to get accrediutation in their own country what then angers him if certain countries require conditions to certain foreign nationals.They forget that they barred the elders from entering zimbabwe when they were needed most,so if they require most to visit they get bored if they get barred.Man one good turn derserves another,that should have clicked in their mind during their time.The shona people would say "Chinokanganwa idemo muti bodo"

    Wednesday, June 17, 2009 phil