PRESIDENT Thabo Mbeki acknowledged in a television interview to be aired on Monday evening that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe is not listening to him. Interviewer Tim Sebastian of the BBC’s “Hard Talk” told Mbeki: “He’s not listening is he?”, to which the president replied: “Well he hasn’t.” Mbeki has engaged in “quiet diplomacy” in a bid to aid Zimbabwe, where the confiscation of white-owned farms and political violence are accompanying economic free-fall. “What I know is that we can’t afford a complete collapse of Zimbabwe on our borders, so we’ve to got to try and do whatever we can,” Mbeki said, adding that he hoped a special team of Commonwealth foreign ministers would be able to help. That group will hold its first meeting in Nigeria August 15-17. The president acknowledged that the Commonwealth had not taken up the issue of Zimbabwe “with any particular vigour publicly”, but said he did not support calls for Zimbabwe’s suspension from that body.
* Nigeria will next week host talks between the foreign ministers of Zimbabwe, Britain and four other Commonwealth countries over the controversial land issue, officials said Monday. – AFP