Johannesburg
05 June 2008
The British government says it has summoned Zimbabwe's ambassador to explain the detention of diplomats on Thursday. According to the U.S. embassy, Zimbabwean police detained U.S. and British diplomats, slashing the tires of their cars after they visited victims of political violence ahead of a presidential runoff election. They were released hours later. Correspondent Scott Bobb reports from our Southern Africa Bureau in Johannesburg.
The U.S. Ambassador to Zimbabwe said the diplomats were detained after their vehicles were stopped at a roadblock outside Harare.
The incident came one day after Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was detained for nine hours by police in a similar incident. Tsvangirai is campaigning against President Robert Mugabe in a runoff presidential election due in three weeks.
Tsvangirai's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party accused the ruling ZANU-PF party of trying to win the election through a campaign of intimidation. The opposition says more than 60 supporters have been killed and thousands displaced since elections in March in which it won a majority in parliament.
The government accuses the opposition of being behind the violence.
The third runner-up in the presidential vote, Simba Makoni Thursday told delegates at an economic forum in Cape Town that the runoff vote should be cancelled because of the escalating violence. Civic groups have made similar calls.
Kenya's Prime Minister Raila Odinga, told the same forum that although African leaders did not want to appear to be interfering in another country's internal affairs he felt he should speak out.
The South African government says its policy of quiet diplomacy is more effective than public criticism in bringing change in Zimbabwe. Officials in Pretoria Thursday said the release of Tsvangirai and his entourage came after the personal intervention of President Thabo Mbeki who has been charged by southern African leaders with mediating the Zimbabwean crisis.