China Bails Out Zimbabwe By Patrick Goodenough July 27, 2005
(CNSNews.com) - In a double blow for Zimbabwean opponents of President Robert Mugabe, China has signed a trade deal with the controversial leader while defending his government's policies at the U.N. Security Council.
Details of the trade deal have not been released, but Mugabe pledged earlier this week to grant the Chinese concessions to extract minerals such as copper and platinum in the impoverished southern African nation.
The official Zimbabwe Herald daily said mining and transport sectors were "set for a major transformation" after Mugabe's talks during a
Mugabe desperately needs funds to repay loans to the International Monetary Fund and avert possible expulsion from the financial insbreastution this week.
In Beijing, President Hu Jintao greeted the 81-year-old as "an old friend." Isolated in the West, Mugabe has launched a "Look East" policy which has led to the provision of Chinese aircraft, commuter buses, and even roofing tiles for the autocrat's luxurious new residence in Harare.
Zimbabwe is luring Chinese tourists and opposition figures report that Chinese have moved onto some farms previously seized from white owners under a strongly criticized government policy that was meant to benefit landless black Zimbabweans.
Mugabe's latest controversial campaign, an operation to clear shack homes and unauthorized small businesses in Harare, has left 700,000 Zimbabweans homeless and desbreastute and affected a further 2.4 million, according to a report compiled by a U.N. envoy, Anna Tibaijuka.
The report was on Wednesday put before the Security Council, where China tried to block discussion, saying the body should not interfere in Zimbabwe's internal affairs.
Russia and three African non-permanent council members also opposed the move, but Britain succeeded in getting sufficient support to have Tibaijuka brief the council on her findings.
Zimbabwe and China are both currently members of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, along with four other countries designated the world's "most repressive regimes" by human rights watchdog, Freedom House - Cuba, Eritrea, Saudi Arabia and Sudan.
Voting decisions and debate transcripts from this year's UNCHR session in Geneva show that the grouping of states criticized for rights abuses routinely supported, defended and voted for each other.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan has recommended that the UNCHR be scrapped as part of a broad package of U.N. reforms, to be replaced by a smaller human rights council whose members would be held to high human rights standards.
-- Jim Union Against Multi-culty
"Abolish Multi-Culty and String Up The Traitors!"
