ETHIOPIA’S former dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam, who lives in exile in Zimbabwe, travelled to South Africa this week for medical treatment, an official said Friday. A spokesman for the South African High Commission in Harare confirmed a report in the Independent newspaper that Mengistu entered South Africa on a Zimbabwean diplomatic passport. Diplomatic sources said Mengistu, wanted in Ethiopia for trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity during his 17-year rule, applied for a visa but was told he did not need one because of his diplomatic passport. They said this had saved the South African government possible embarrassment as granting a visa would have offended Ethiopia. The Independent says Zimbabwe’s authorities sought an undertaking from South Africa that Mengistu would be allowed to return unhindered. President Robert Mugabe, an old ally of Mengistu’s, gave the former dictator asylum when he fled as rebels closed in on his capital in 1991, and has since refused requests for his extradition to Ethiopia.