Zimbabwe sanctions vetoed at UN
The word which the British foreign secretary used to describe this is "incomprehensible", and I find myself in complete agreement.
A draft resolution to impose sanctions on Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and a number of his key allies has been vetoed at the UN Security Council. China and Russia rejected the proposed measures, which included a freeze on financial assets and a travel ban.Apparently Russia had promised to support the resolution when President Dmitry Medvedev attended the G8 summit last week, so this U-turn caught everyone by surprise.
The US ambassador to the UN, Zalmay Khalilzad, said Russia's veto raised "questions about its reliability as a G8 partner".I knew that China had close ties with many African nations and that South Africa might be able to persuade them to veto the resolution, though I had also hoped the worldwide condemnations which would follow this might make China - so close to the Olympic games - think again. Apparently not.
Russia, however, are the real shock here. I didn't see that coming. And the Russian solidarity almost lets China off the hook. Apparently they have both acted out of concern for Russian and Chinese weapons exporters. I'm glad they've acted out of principle. It would be dreadful if the dictator were to be denied his weapons. I mean, how could he properly deny his people democracy without them?
I am left wondering what Mugabe has to do to get the world community to reign him in.
And it's no surprise that, once again, Mbeki is offering Mugabe cover as he has always done. He's rapidly becoming as guilty of crime as Mugabe himself, he's certainly guilty of enabling the old creep to carry out his dirty work.The UK ambassador said after the vote that the UN had failed in its duty.
"The people of Zimbabwe need to be given hope that there is an end in sight to their suffering," said Sir John Sawers. "The Security Council today has failed to offer them that hope."
However, Russia's ambassador Vitaly Churkin said sanctions would have taken the UN beyond its mandate.
Zimbabwe's ambassador told the BBC the vote should that "reason has prevailed".
"People have been able to see the machinations of Washington, London and France," said Boniface Chidyausiku.
South Africa voted against the sanctions resolution. It has promoted a power-sharing arrangement between President Mugabe and the opposition.
And the violence in Zimbabwe is ongoing, even as China and Russia offer their vetoes:
Unbelievable. So it's okay to interfere in the internal affairs of Iraq, despite the fact that Saddam had actually brutalised his people ten years earlier than the UN intervention, but we have no business interfering in the internal affairs of Zimbabwe even as the brutality continues. Perhaps we should have lied and said that we thought that Mugabe had WMD. Maybe that would have raised the issue to the point where we could claim it became a "threat to international peace and security." For that's another reason the Russians have cited to claim that the UN are acting "beyond it's mandate".Violence in Zimbabwe shows no signs of abating. The opposition Movement for Democratic Change says 113 of its activists have been killed since March.
Many of the wounded have sustained horrific burns and other telltale signs of torture. Yesterday, the MDC said another official, Gift Mutsvungunu, had been murdered. His body was found partly burned and with eyes gouged out in a suburb of Harare, Reuters reported.
So what are they really worried about here? Chechnya?
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