The Zimbabwe government has denied receiving strong criticism from fellow Africans of its human rights record, including a mass eviction campaign it conducted in urban slums, the state-run Herald newspaper said on Friday.
The African Union’s Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights protested in a resolution adopted last month and circulated in Harare by independent groups on Thursday what it called the continuing deterioration in human rights in Zimbabwe, lack of respect for the rule of law and ”growing culture of impunity”.
”Government is not aware of any such resolution by the African Union or any of its organs,” foreign ministry spokesperson John Mayowe told the Herald.
President Robert Mugabe routinely dismisses criticism by human rights groups as inspired by opponents backed by former colonial ruler Britain and the United States. However, his government is acutely sensitive to censure by fellow African nations.
The AU commission’s comments were a rare example of the continental body sharply criticising one of its own. It said last year’s mass evictions violated individual and collective rights and urged Zimbabwe ”to ensure that those responsible for the violations are brought to justice without delay”.
The government’s Operation Murambatsvina left about 700 000 people without homes, jobs or both, according to United Nations estimates, and was criticised by two UN envoys last year.
Mugabe’s government disputes the figures and defends the campaign as an urban renewal drive.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan is considering a visit to see conditions in Zimbabwe for himself. The Herald reported on Friday that Annan was expected here in March, but officials at UN headquarters in New York said the trip was still under discussion.
Zimbabwe previously denied receiving an adverse report by the AU commission in 2002, and then asked for more time to prepare a response.
As a result, it was two years before the AU formally accepted the commission’s report.
That report called for the repeal of repressive security and media laws, and the restoration of free expression, association and assembly.
The latest resolution was adopted by a meeting of the commission in the Gambian capital, Banjul, ahead of an AU summit scheduled in Khartoum, Sudan, later this month. — Sapa-AP