German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday defended her attack on Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s human rights record at the European Union-Africa summit in Lisbon, which saw her branded a racist by Harare.
“Freedom and tolerance, democracy and human rights form the foundation for existing side-by-side in dignity,” Merkel told lawmakers in the German lower House of parliament.
“One cannot relativise these values. They either exist fully or not at all.”
Merkel said the EU-Africa summit in the Portuguese capital last weekend had again demonstrated that Germany’s “foreign policy is based on principles”.
“Promoting our economic interests and defending human rights are two sides of the same coin for us,” she said.
Merkel used the summit to launch a stinging attack on Mugabe, who is seen by the West as a ruthless dictator who rigged his 2002 re-election and has led his once-prosperous country to economic ruin.
She accused the Zimbabwean leader of trampling on human rights and “harming the image of the new Africa” in a speech that has sparked a war of words between Berlin and Harare.
Several African leaders accused Merkel of being out of touch with the situation in Zimbabwe while that country’s information minister, Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, branded her a racist and said she should “shut up”.
“Zimbabwe is not a colony of Germany. This is racism of the first order by the German head of state,” he told Zimbabwe’s Herald newspaper.
The German Foreign Ministry on Tuesday summoned the charge d’affaires at the Zimbabwean embassy in Berlin to protest at Ndlovu’s outburst. — AFP