US reveals its efforts to topple Mugabe regime

[Up2Late]

Source: The Guardian (U.K.)

US reveals its efforts to topple Mugabe regime

· State department tells of regime change strategy
· Washington funded opposition activities

Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Friday April 6, 2007
The Guardian

The US admitted openly for the first time yesterday that it was actively working to undermine Robert Mugabe, the president of Zimbabwe.

Although officially Washington does not support regime change, a US state department report published yesterday acknowledged that it was supporting opposition politicians in the country and others critical of Mr Mugabe. The state department also admitted sponsoring events aimed at "discrediting" statements made by Mr Mugabe's government....

(edit)

In an unusual piece of candour, the state department report says: "To encourage greater public debate on restoring good governance in (Zimbabwe), the United States sponsored public events that presented economic and social analyses discrediting the government's excuses for its failed policies....

(edit)

Asked whether US efforts to promote human rights worldwide were being undermined by the hundreds of of people being held at Guantánamo, Mr Lowenkren insisted the issue was not raised by non-governmental groups at conferences he attended and participants were more interested in what the US could do to help them in their own countries....

(more at link)


Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/zimbabwe/article/0,,2051354,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=1

---

This is just great, we are down to basically two Governments (Zimbabwe and Russia) that we can truthfully claim to be better than, but yet we only mildly criticize them. I wonder if the WH will claim this report was a mistake or a leak or something in a few days?

[BayCityProgressive]

1. Even though Mugabe IS BAD

the US meddling there will not help. It will only make him more popular. People in Latin America and Africa are SICK TO DEATH of colonialism. Let the African Union deal with this.

[Rage for Order]

4. The African Union supports Mugabe

http://www.guardian.co.uk/zimbabwe/article/0,2763,1514360,00.html

African Union defends Mugabe


Ewen MacAskill, diplomatic editor, Vikram Dodd and Eric Allison
Saturday June 25, 2005
The Guardian

The African Union yesterday rejected calls by Britain and the US to intervene in Zimbabwe, where the president, Robert Mugabe, is conducting a slum clearance programme that has left hundreds of thousands homeless.

Desmond Orjiako, a spokesman for the AU, which represents 53 African states, said: "I do not think it is proper for the AU commission to start running the internal affairs of members' states." He suggested there were various good reasons for the demolitions, including preventing Harare turning into a slum.

The Foreign Office, which has been leading a campaign against Mr Mugabe, has expressed frustration over the last four years at the failure of South Africa and other AU members to act against - or even criticise - Mr Mugabe in spite of human rights abuses and rigged elections.

edited to remove duplicate copy & pasting

[BayCityProgressive]

5. hm thanks for that link!

Well I believe most of the West already has economic sanctions on the country..if Zimbabwe doesn't want us there and the African Union doesn't want us there..what else can you do really?

[Rage for Order]

6. I agree, but it appears nobody is going to do anything

Very sad situation

Edit to add: I saw something more recent, sometime this week I thought, where the AU re-affirmed its support for Mugabe. I didn't notice this article was dated June of 2005 until after I posted it. I'm sure I just saw them say the same thing this week though.

Edit again: found what I saw this week:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/africa/03/29/zimbabwe.summit/index.html

DAR ES SALAAM, Tanzania (CNN) -- Southern African leaders Thursday emerged from a conference in Tanzania's capital allied with embattled Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe and calling for the lifting of all sanctions against his government.

Mugabe maintains a tight grip on power as his country spirals into economic disaster.

After the Southern Africa Development Community emergency summit, Mugabe described the meeting as "excellent."

"We are one with our neighbors," he said.

A joint communique issued by the 14 SADC leaders reaffirmed the group's solidarity with Zimbabwe's government and people, and mandated that South African President Thabo Mbeki continue his efforts to facilitate dialogue between Zimbabwe's opposition groups and the government.

[DancerDr.]

7. They would rather keep Mugabe in power than push the international community to act

What's it to them.

[BayCityProgressive]

8. I know the South Africans

have hinted they would like to see him gone. I bet one of the main reasons for this is that if the AU supports overthrowing one gov. in the unstable region..the West will use it as an excuse to do it to others in the region..just guessing here..but I think they are trying to send a message of "leave each country alone"..it is understandable in their situation but sad given the situation in Zimbabwe. Who do the people of the country support? Mugabe or the opposition?

[Rage for Order]

10. I'm not that familiar with it

But based on my limited knowledge I'd say ABM, or Anyone But Mugabe. He razed some slums, displacing tens of thousands of people in what some described as political persecution. He said it was a campaign to clean up the streets. Add to that the famine gripping the country and my guess would be the people would be happy to try something different. But again, I'm no expert on Zimbabwe

[1932]

18. I'm not sure that that wasn't a set up.

I read an article in the African press about how that shanty town was formed.

Oppostion parties (and I'm sure they were supported by the US state department) encouraged people to move from the countryside to the shanty town with the promise of jobs. The plan was, apparently, not to give them jobs, but to build up a critical mass, make them discontent, and encourage them to riot, causing a political crisis. The government cleared the purpose-built shanty town before critical mass and rioting happened.

How can you criticize that? I mean, what did you want them to do? Those people were lured with lies to that shanty town and were going to be pawns in an effort to get a government that was friendlier to American investment bankers. A lot of them probably would have died.

[nodehopper]

21. yeah but Mugabe's aspirations for ethnic cleansing via agricultural "reform"

are all his own doing.

[1932]

25. I'm going to have to see a link for that.

From what I've read about agricultural reform, the one failing was that everyone was promised a certain amount of time with a tractor, but they've had such terrible inflation that they couldn't afford to give people gas for the tractor. Now, if you've read previous books by the author in my sig line, you might come to the conclusion that inflation is often a result of policies dicated by the IMF and the west rather than by policies by the country suffering the inflation.

I believe the tractors were delivered without regard to ethnicity.

[PaulaFarrell]

31. I think the problem is that they displaced experienced

Farming is not intuitive. It requires experience and/or training.

"The government has finally admitted that its land reform programme has failed to provide food for the country. Addressing a meeting of the Zimbabwe Farmers Union in Bulawayo, Deputy Minister for Agriculture Sylvester Nguni said that farms had been given to people who did not have the faintest idea about farming. Nguni said "The problem is we gave land to people lacking the passion for farming, and this is why every year production has been declining."

Referring to the recent land audits instituted by the government, Nguni said they were being conducted by officials with no knowledge of agriculture. "The same officers who bungled land allocations are the ones we send to do the audits.” Nguni added that the problem facing the Zimbabwe government was that it was not telling the truth about why agricultural production had drastically plummeted. The government has consistently claimed that the decline has been caused by a combination of drought and illegal sanctions imposed by Britain and her allies.

The evidence tells a different story. Official rainfall data provided by the government indicates that the recent drought was nowhere near as severe as the one in 1991-1992, during and after which the country still managed to feed itself. Despite the relatively mild drought of 2001, above average rainfall in 2003 ensured that dams retained sufficient levels to last at least until the next season. Another lie consistently being peddled is that of sanctions.

The only sanctions in place are aimed exclusively at individuals in Mugabe’s government. So how can these carefully targeted measures be responsible for the collapse of agricultural output on the farms? Tuesday’s admission by Nguni that land reform has failed makes a mockery of recent statements made by Mugabe at a UN food conference at which he said that Zimbabwe’s land programme was responsible for creating a wider base of farmers in the country and that land, land, land means food, food, food to the people”.

http://www.swradioafrica.com/news021105/landreform021105.htm


Six years after President Robert Mugabe sanctioned violent invasions of Zimbabwe's commercial farmland - mostly but not entirely white-owned - by landless peasants, the facts show that the so-called "new farmers" have failed dramatically to produce crops to feed their countrymen.

The poor peasants who led the invasions, at the behest of Mugabe, have since been driven off the best farms. The prime properties have been reallocated to the president and his close relatives, ministers, the country's top judges and armed forces and police officers, and pliant journalists. These farms are mainly used as weekend retreats and, for the most part, have ceased to be productive.

"It looks like land reform was never meant to benefit the ordinary person," said Professor Gordon Chavunduka, a veteran African nationalist and former vice chancellor of the University of Zimbabwe. "Land reform was only meant to benefit a few special individuals, and that may lay the ground for future conflicts."

In a typical example, 96 peasant families who settled on the state-of-the-art Eirene Farm at Marondera, 80 km southeast of Harare, were subsequently forcibly removed when Mugabe allocated the property to his air force chief, Air Marshal Perence Shiri. The farm was the property of Hamish Charters, who was driven from his home and badly beaten up in 2002.
http://iwpr.net/?p=acr&s=f&o=325987&apc_state=henpacr

In fact, the beneficiaries of the land seizures are, with few exceptions, ruling-party officials and friends of the President's. Although Mugabe's people seem to view the possession of farms as a sign of status (the Minister of Home Affairs has five; the Minister of Information has three; Mugabe's wife, Grace, and scores of influential party members and their relatives have two each), these elites don't have the experience, the equipment, or, apparently, the desire to run them. About 130,000 formerly landless peasants helped the ruling elites to take over the farms, but now that the dirty work is done, many of them are themselves being expelled.

The drop-off in agricultural production is staggering. Maize farming, which yielded more than 1.5 million tons annually before 2000, is this year expected to generate just 500,000 tons. Wheat production, which stood at 309,000 tons in 2000, will hover at 27,000 tons this year. Tobacco production, too, which at 265,000 tons accounted for nearly a third of the total foreign-currency earnings in 2000, has tumbled, to about 66,000 tons in 2003.

http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/news/opeds/2003/power_kill_country_am_1203.htm

[Alexander]

11. Who do they support?

We'd probably have a better idea if Mugabe wasn't having ballot boxes stuffed.

[IndianaGreen]

15. This was a major moral failure by the AU

Mugabe is a dictator and he is persecuting the opposition. Having said that, the United States does not have the best interests of the people of Zimbabwe when it speaks of regime change. As a matter of fact, having the US state publicly that it is financing the opposition to Mugabe, has given ammo to Mugabe to use against his opponents.

[Ignacio Upton]

37. Honestly, things are so bad in Zimbabwe

That Iraqis are better off. There are many rulers throughout the world that are worse than Bush, but the full extent of their oppression isn't known because they don't control super power countries.

[DancerDr.]

2. Just Zimbabwe and Russia?

Belarus? Burma? and China? What about Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Saudi Arabia? Sudan and Uzbekistan aren't exactly models of good government.

[BayCityProgressive]

3. None of them invaded and killed

1 million Iraqis like we did...but I understand what you are saying. There are MANY bad governments in the world..I totally agree with you.

[grytpype]

9. I think Zimbabwe is the one country in the world that would be improved if Bush ruled it.

He couldn't do worse than Mugabe.

[knight_of_the_star]

12. I dunno

I think the things holding him back in the US is if he did half of what Mugabe has done he would be lynched posthaste on Pennsylvania Avenue, he might try if he could get away with it.

[nodehopper]

23. good point!

[President Kerry]

13. lol... Sadly, I believe you are right.

There IS somebody with even worse economic policies than our fearless leader.

[BushOut06]

14. Nonsense - if Bush were president in Zimbabwe, he'd be invading neighboring countries

He might not have the global reach that he does with the US, but I'm sure that he could manage to cause quite a bit of headaches in the region.

[nodehopper]

22. North Korea?

[otherlander]

16. SHIT!!!

Now the thug has the "evil colonialists are threatening me" card to play. FUCK!!!

[1932]

17. Are you sure that it isn't US lies that make you think Mugabe is bad?

A couple years ago I read in an AFRICAN newspaper about how the IMF was angry at Zimbabwe because the government created seven investment banks that were undermining the domination of the economy by Wall St banks. They flipped out and said that Zimbabwe needed to close 5 of them or there would be consequences. They said it was bad for the economy to have Zimbabweans making money off of Zimbawean resources rather than haing them ship all their wealth off to New York, London and Zurich. (They obviously weren't talking about the Zimbabwean economy.)

Now, I wonder if all the stories you read in American papers are talking about exaclty this same issue without talking about it at all. I wonder if the New York Times is really worried about western bankers not getting to dominate the Zimbabwean economy, so they write a bunch of bullshit about European-owned rhino sanctuaries having to give their land to poor farmers like it's a bad thing.

I think that I learned 100000 times more about what's really going on in Zimbabwe when I read about those invetment banks than I learned from reading 10 years of reading New York Times articles on Africa.

[otherlander]

19. Yeah, I'm pretty sure, actually.

Land for farmers instead of the elites = good
Beating the crap out of opposition leaders = not good

But you do bring up an important point about the IMF, and it's not just them, either. The CIA has made up stories about lots of countries because their governments stood up to American interests. Which brings up another problem: these global powers are guilty of such atrocities, that naturally, people are desperate for change, and need governments that will protect them from imperialists, so they become willing to ignore the crimes of anti-imperialist leaders.

[1932]

20. I'm not sure that beating the crap out of the opposition leader is as it's presented

by the western media.

Get my point?

I mean, this is how it always is. Allende. Chavez. Even bad guys like Hussein. It's usually a bunch of lies and false flag operations and if it's printed in the NYTimes, 99% chance that it's paid advertisement for neoliberalism and it's not the truth.

I mean, seriously. Think hard about why you believe what you believe.

[nodehopper]

24. Dismissing the news coming out of Zimbabwe as propaganda

is kind of like when Chomsky was all like "oh, those Khmer Rouge, they are fluffy kittens, the US is just painting them in bad colors because of anti-communist propaganda."

You might have a hard time getting food if you are not Shona is Zimbabwe...and Mugabe's been pretty straightforward about how there are 6 million extra people in Zimbabwe.

[1932]

26. Just today I was reading Chomsky. He actually says that Vietnam's invasion of

Cambodia to bring and end to the Khmer Rouge along with Indias invasion of Bengal to stop attrocities there are probably the only two times when one could say that the use of military force was actually used for humanitarian purposes.

The US, however, didn't agree and encouraged China to invade Vietnam in retaliation.

I read that just today. It's in Hegemony and Survival. Around page 20.

You seem to be misinformed.

[1932]

27. Here's what Chomsky ACTUALLY said about Pol Pot:

http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0805074007&id=7idg2XjTVroC&pg=PA22&lpg=PA22&vq=khmer+rouge&sig=yGj9W41Cp0qBXe11kHImmxLlCEY&hl=en#PPA22,M1

fluffy kittens? Huh? It's more like "terrible crimes" and "attrocities" and he is criticizing the US government for NOT doing anything about it.

[nodehopper]

35. I am not misinformed

Chomsky came around w/r/t his views on the Khmer Rouge, renounced his initial positions, which is reflected in his later writings, and admitted that genocide happened in 1988 in "Manufacturing Consent" but initially he dismissed all the news of the genocide coming out of then-Kampuchia, including testimonies by refugees and survivors. Was Chomsky's analysis of US media bias and rhetoric useful and necessary? Yes, it has always been, and I commend him for that. But in his bias towards a newly-established vanguard regime of the people and his (albeit, not unreasonable) suspicion on the US media machine, he did claim that the Khmer slaughter was a Moss-NYT creation.

I guess my point is, just because the US media machine is a filthy outfit, frequently full of lies, spin, and progaganda, it doesn't mean there aren't genuine dictators and villains in the world. Mugabe and Kim Jong Il apologists to me are just as removed from the "reality-based community" as Bush supporters.

The first place where I read about Mugabe's policies of withholding food from the non-Shona speakers, who, by and large support the opposition party was Russian press, so I am not going to link that (unless you are fluent in Russian), but here is an interesting piece, that incidentally features the same quote from Mutusa, Mugabe's chief of state security, about being better off with "six million "
http://www.sokwanele.com/thisiszimbabwe/archives/454

may I ask why you have the Stiglitz book in your signature? I am curious because I almost applied for a postdoc for a research group he heads (was thwarted by April 1st falling on a Sunday and buerocratic sticklerism)

[Up2Late]

28. First of all, I don't read "American Newspapers about Zimbabwe" and this isn't from the NYT either.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but I'm not a big fan of American "newspaper" and/or the so-called MSM.

Next point, what you read "...A couple years ago I read in an AFRICAN newspaper..." is by definition "old news" and most likely has little to nothing to do with the current financial crisis there. Things tend to change very quickly when the monetary inflation rate is running at close to 5000%.

People at all levels of society are trying to flee the country to South Africa! And South Africa is so overwhelmed that they can't take anymore people.

I think you need a refresher on the current situation there, this JUNE 27, 2006 (on-line) video from FRONTLINE/World explains the situation very well: <http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/zimbabwe504/>

<http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/zimbabwe504/video_index.html>

And then there is these reports from Human Rights Watch:

Zimbabwe: Security Forces Extend Crackdown to Public

SADC Summit Should Address Crisis

(Johannesburg, March 28, 2007) – The government of Zimbabwe has permitted security forces to commit serious abuses with impunity against opposition activists and ordinary Zimbabweans alike, Human Rights Watch said today. Security forces are responsible for arbitrary arrests and detentions and beatings of opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) supporters, civil society activists, and the general public.

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) heads of state are meeting today at an extraordinary summit in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania to discuss, among other issues, the political situation in Zimbabwe. Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is scheduled to attend the meeting. Human Rights Watch called on the sub-regional organization to take strong measures to address the escalating crisis.

“The government of Zimbabwe has intensified its brutal suppression of its own citizens in an effort to crush all forms of dissent,” said Georgette Gagnon, deputy Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “The crackdown shows the government has extended its attack on political dissent to ordinary Zimbabweans, which should prompt the SADC to act quickly.”

Human Rights Watch recently spent two weeks in Zimbabwe interviewing many victims of abuse and witnesses to the political unrest in the cities of Harare, Bulawayo and Mutare. Witnesses and victims from Harare’s high-density suburbs of Glenview, Highfield and Mufakose told Human Rights Watch that for the past few weeks police forces patrolling these locations have randomly and viciously beaten Zimbabweans in the streets, shopping malls, and in bars and beer halls. (more at link) <http://hrw.org/english/docs/2007/03/28/zimbab15578.htm>

Or this: <http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/10/30/zimbab14478.htm>

Or this:

<http://hrw.org/reports/2006/zimbabwe1106/>

And besides, this post was about the incompetence of the U.S. Department of State!:banghead:

[Unvanguard]

29. Mugabe is a thug and a bigot

but US interference, as usual, is guaranteed to make things worse.

[Codeine]

30. Is there any 3rd World thug that doesn't

have a DU fan club? :eyes:

[Mike Daniels]

32. Nope. Sadly, they all have their small group of defenders

It seems that as long as you hate Bush you can pretty much run your country into the ground and someone from DU will defend your policies strictly because you stuck it to the "white imperialistic pigs".

[Odin2005]

36. It's that tiny group, unfortunately, the Pukes use to attack all of us as

"Hate America Firsters" and similar BS.

[Dutch]

34. Hey, he hates Bush, so who cares how he treats his own people!

AMERICA FIRST!!!


And if this is reeaally necessary for anyone::sarcasm:

[Up2Late]

39. I think it's that Left and Centrist people have loss all confidence in the News.

And then when they realize that even when "The News" was relatively good, it still told a lot of half-truths and lies, or more correctly, "Lies of Omission."

Then once they realize that, it takes them a while to come to grips with the fact that the "news" media has been playing them for Suckers (Suckers in the old, mid 20th Century sense of the word). Myself, I was very happy with CNN/Headline News from it's beginning in the 1980's until July 2001 when the actually came out and said (in on-Air advertising) that they were "Changing Everything." Boy, did they. I tried to watch it for a few months, but it just got so bad and full of empty information after 9/11 that I just gave up watching all T.V. News. Now it's NPR, Rss, DU-LBN and on-line news now only for me.

Truthfully, I really don't think the people currently running the U.S. Government even have a clue how bad the situation in Africa has become, so when they see reports that come out by Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International, even they don't have enough info to know if they should believe these report, because they are so different to what they've allowed themselves to believe.

Frankly, to the Bush Cabal, if it isn't news that will effect their buddies in the Oil and Gas industries, I doubt they even care.

Speaking of Amnesty International, here's a Press Release from them too:

<http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGUSA20070328001>

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL USA
PRESS RELEASE

March 28, 2007

Amnesty International Demands End to Harassment, Torture and Intimidation of Opposition Activists in Zimbabwe

(New York) -- Amnesty International expressed outrage at today's dramatic events in Zimbabwe, including the arrest and subsequent release of Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai. The human rights organization called for an end to the continued brutal harassment, torture and intimidation of opposition activists in Zimbabwe.

"We are very concerned by reports of continuing brutal attacks on opposition activists in Zimbabwe and call on the government to stop all acts of violence and intimidation against opposition activists," said Kolawole Olaniyan, Director of Amnesty International?s Africa Program.

The organization also called on African leaders meeting in the region to take action in response to today's events.

"African leaders have allowed the government of Zimbabwe to operate outside the international human rights framework by deciding to adopt a strategy of quiet diplomacy -- a tactic that in this case has left the victims of human rights violations to suffer without protection," said Olaniyan.

"Southern African Development Community (SADC) leaders meeting in Tanzania must now send an unequivocal message to the government of Zimbabwe that human rights violations in that country will no longer be tolerated."

Amnesty International obtained the following information regarding recent attacks on opposition activists in Zimbabwe:

* Morgan Tsvangirai, President of Zimbabwe's opposition MDC party, was arrested today at his office in Harare together with at least 20 MDC party workers and members. Lawyers were denied access to those arrested and some were also threatened with arrest. Police are reported to have closed all roads leading to the offices and eyewitnesses report seeing police loading furniture into trucks. Tsvangirai was subsequently released.

* In a raid early this morning police arrested Paul Madzore and his wife Melody Kuzvinetsa at their home. They also assaulted other occupants in the house. Paul Madzore is a Member of Parliament (MP) for Glen View, a constituency in Harare. Their whereabouts are unknown.

* Also early today, police arrested Ian Makone and his wife Theresa Makone at their Borrowdale home in Harare. Ian Makone is a member of the MDC?s National Executive Committee. Theresa Makone is the MDC chairperson for Mashonaland East Province.

* Police are also reported to have today arrested Pineal Denga and his wife in Marondera. Pineal Denga is the organising secretary of the MDC in Mashonaland East province. The couple?s whereabouts are also unknown.

* At 12.00 pm on 27 March, Last Maengahama was abducted outside the Borrowdale Shopping Centre in Harare by people in plain clothes who are believed to be security agents. Maengahama was returning from a memorial service for Gift Tandare, an activist who was shot dead by police in Harare on March 11, 2007. Maengahama is also an MDC activist. He was later dumped by his abductors in Mutorashanga, some 100 kilometers from Harare. He had been severely beaten and is currently receiving medical treatment at a private hospital in Harare.

Amnesty International called on the Zimbabwean government to ensure that all those arrested have immediate access to lawyers, doctors and their families and are promptly brought to court to review the legality of their detention.

The government must also guarantee their safety and well-being and immediately investigate any allegations of torture.

"Anyone detained solely for peacefully exercising their right to freedom of expression or assembly must be immediately and unconditionally released," said Olaniyan.
###


Contact: Suzanne Trimel, 212-633-4150 or Ben Somberg, 212-633-4268

<http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGUSA20070328001>

[booley]

33. Sheesh, I hate times like this

When the stupidity of my government leaves me arguing to seemingly defend a vile dictator..but while the world will not miss Mugabe in anyway...the blow back from this will probbaly get out of control just like iraq..or Iran or Guataala or all the other "regime changes" our government has done over the years. Somehow the US gov has been able to make things worse in almost every instance.

Besides, call me a cynic but I doubt Shrub hates Mugabe becuase of his horrible human rights record.

[superconnected]

38. Bush isn't going in there to free people, it's to give out contracts

and collect assets.

And boy is their country going to get even worse when dimwit takes over.