South Africa to host regional summit on Zimbabwe
S. Africa: South Africa will host a special regional summit on Monday
to discuss the crisis in Zimbabwe, officials said on Thursday.
The summit follows the failure of talks earlier this week to bridge
the divide between Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and Morgan
Tsvangirai, leader of the main opposition Movement for Democratic
Change, on forming a power-sharing government.
“The summit of heads of state and government is expected to be
attended by all (Southern African Development Community) member states,”
the South African Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Zimbabwe is a member of SADC and the statement said the MDC was also
expected to attend the summit.
South African President Kgalema Motlanthe, Mozambique’s President
Armando Guebuza and Thabo Mbeki, SADC mediator and former South African
president, met the two Zimbabwean sides in Harare last Monday but no
agreement was reached. A unity government is seen as the best chance of
preventing total collapse in once prosperous Zimbabwe, where prices
double every day and more than 2,000 people have died in a cholera
epidemic.
A September power-sharing deal has stalled amid disputes over who
should control key ministries.
Johannesburg, Thursday, Reuters
|