Shame, shame, shame' Mugabe tells U.S. and Britain
Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe on Thursday berated the United
States and former colonial power Britain and its allies for trying to control
his nation and its resources.
``Shame, shame, shame to the U.S. Shame, shame, shame to
Britain and its allies," Mugabe, 89, said in a speech to the UN General
Assembly.
``Zimbabwe is for Zimbabweans, so are its resources. Please
remove your illegal and filthy sanctions from my peaceful country.''
Mugabe said that the sanctions imposed by the EU and the
U.S. violated the UN Charter on state sovereignty and condemned them as a
"foreign-policy tool to effect regime change".
The U.S. and the EU imposed sanctions on Zimbabwean state
firms and travel restrictions on Mugabe and dozens of his associates after a
violent 2000 election, and at the start of sometimes violent seizures of
white-owned commercial farms for black resettlement.
Mugabe did not refer to the lifting of EU sanctions on September
17 against Zimbabwe Mining Development Corp., which will allow the
diamond-mining firm to sell its diamonds in Europe.
He said that sanctions constituted a form of hostility and
violence against his government, which was only trying to redistribute land to
the majority of landless Zimbabweans.
"Our small and peaceful country is threatened daily by
covetous and bigoted big powers whose hunger for domination and control of
other nations and their resources know no bounds," he said.
He said that if the sanctions were intended to unseat him
from power "the results of the recent national elections have clearly
shown you what they can do."
Mugabe, who has ruled Zimbabwe since independence from
Britain in 1980, overwhelmingly won a July 31 vote extending his 33-year rule.
His main rival, Morgan Tsvangirai, denounced the poll as a "huge
fraud."
Washington said the election was flawed and that it does not
plan to loosen sanctions against Mugabe's government.
Mugabe said the U.S. was determined to continue its
"relentless persecution" of Zimbabwe, even though the AU and other
regional organisations had supported the election result.
"It appears that when the U.S. and its allies speak of
democracy and freedom they are doing so only in relative terms," Mugabe
said.
"Zimbabwe, however, refuses to accept that these
Western detractors have the right to define democracy and freedom for us.
"We paid the ultimate price for it and we are
determined never to relinquish our sovereignty and remain master of our
destiny. Zimbabwe will never be a colony again."
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