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Mbeki
to discuss Zimbabwe crisis with
AU chairman |
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JOHANNESBURG(July
16,2008) - South African President Thabo Mbeki and
the African Union's top diplomat will meet on Friday to discuss the
political crisis in Zimbabwe, an Mbeki spokesman said on Monday.
Officials from Zimbabwe's ruling ZANU-PF and the opposition Movement
for Democratic Change met last week for the first time since President
Robert Mugabe's June 27 re-election, which was boycotted by the opposition
and condemned by Western nations.
South Africa's government is mediating the talks in Pretoria.
"The president called the meeting in order to brief Mr (Jean)
Ping on developments in the Zimbabwe facilitation process," Mbeki
spokesman Mukoni Ratshitanga said. He added they would meet on Friday.
Ping is the most senior permanent AU official.
The AU has urged both sides to negotiate a power-sharing deal that
would pave the way for a unity government, which is seen by many African
leaders as the only way to avert further violence and total economic
collapse in Zimbabwe.
The once prosperous African nation has the world's highest inflation
rate, estimated to be at least 2 million percent, and unemployment
hovers around 80 percent. Millions of its people have fled abroad
in search of food and work.
Tsvangirai has come under African pressure to enter into full-blown
negotiations with Mugabe, who has branded the MDC puppets of the West
and vowed to never let them take power.
Mugabe, 84, says the opposition must recognise his landslide victory
in the election last month.
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