Zimbabwe opposition urges world to isolate Mugabe as 'tyrant'

HARARE, Zimbabwe (Reuters) -- Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change on Wednesday called on the international community to isolate President Robert Mugabe as a "tyrant" who is using racism and violence to hang on to power.

Two MDC members of parliament charged that there was no difference between Mugabe and the deposed Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic.

"The time has come for organizations like the Commonwealth, like the European Union, like the United Nations, to recognize that Mugabe is a tyrant," MDC legal secretary David Coltart said at a news conference called to respond to Mugabe's latest attack on whites last week.

Mugabe threatened to put on trial former white Rhodesian minority leader Ian Smith and other whites -- including Coltart and fellow MDC parliamentarian Mike Auret -- for alleged atrocities committed during the country's 1970s liberation war.

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Mugabe was reacting to an unprecedented bid by the MDC, which he says is driven by white Zimbabweans, to impeach him for alleged gross misconduct and violation of the constitution.

"Ian Smith and the whites who participated in the massacre and genocide of our people, those who fought against us we shall try. After all, in Europe they are still hunting the Nazis, those who fought on the side of Hitler.

"We will look for those who fought on the side of Ian Smith. If they are still in the country, then they must be arrested," Mugabe said after declaring that he was revoking his policy of national reconciliation.

"Coltart and Auret will not be spared from that arrest," he said of the MDC members of parliament (MPs).

Coltart and Auret said they were conscripted into Smith's army but that their consciences on their involvement were clear.

"Mugabe is using hate speech against a tiny ethnic minority. We know the consequences of that hate speech when it was used by Milosevic and others," Coltart said.

"The question the international community must ask itself is 'What is the difference between Mugabe and Milosevic?' Why is it that travel bans are not imposed on Mugabe? Why is it that the Hague (International Court of Justice) is not investigating him for crimes against humanity?"

Mugabe accuses whites of financially backing the MDC, which won 57 of 150 parliamentary seats in June elections and poses the strongest challenge to his 20-year-long rule.

Coltart and Auret said former South African President Nelson Mandela could play a key role in working out an honorable exit for Mugabe.

The 76-year-old Mugabe, in power since the former Rhodesia gained independence from Britain in 1980, is fighting for his political life in a deepening economic crisis that has sparked several serious riots in the last two years.

He denies he is guilty of mismanagement, arguing "no one could have managed the economy better" and that his problems are due to sabotage by domestic and foreign opponents seeking to replace his nationalist government with a puppet administration.

Coltart and Auret said Mugabe and his ruling ZANU-PF movement were under immense public pressure and had resorted to violence, racism and insults in a bid to cover up their shortcomings and to smash the opposition.

"ZANU-PF has a well-documented history of political thuggery and violence, starting right from its birth in the early 1960s. Whenever it feels threatened, as it does now, it resorts to that," said Auret, a 64-year-old veteran human rights campaigner and former head of the Catholic Commission for Justice and Peace.

Coltart warned that Mugabe's racist attacks could spell disaster for the region.

"The consequences for Zimbabwe, the entire region and Africa are horrendous. If Zimbabwe, as an experiment in multiracialism, doesn't work, what hope will there be for South Africa?"

"It is well known that race relations are much better here than in South Africa, and yet Mugabe is out to poison them because his presidency is at stake," he said.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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