Annan: ‘Intolerable’ situation in Zimbabwe

Celean Jacobson

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa — Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan described the situation in Zimbabwe as “intolerable” on Sunday, and criticized African leaders who cling to power.

He also made a veiled reference to the crisis in western Sudan, saying “national sovereignty can no longer be used as a shield by governments that massacre their own people.”

Annan was delivering the fifth annual Nelson Mandela lecture — one of numerous events marking the 89th birthday on July 18 of the anti-apartheid hero and former South African president.

“The ever-downward spiral of Zimbabwe is both intolerable and unsustainable; we all have a stake in resolving the crisis,” Annan said.

Mandela — an international icon for peace and reconciliation — lamented that he was “too old” to contribute to the resolution of international and continental conflicts, and said he looked to the younger generation, including Annan.

“While our continent of Africa has been making great strides toward peace, stability, democracy and respect for human rights, much still remains to be done. This we must acknowledge as we look at the remaining conflicts on our continent,” Mandela said in a rare speech on international relations.

Annan described Mandela as a “wonderful example on a continent where presidents have, in some cases, defied or changed their countries’ constitutions and clung to power for decades.”

This was seen as a thinly-veiled reference to Zimbabwe’s 83-year-old President Robert Mugabe, who has been in power since the country’s 1980 independence from Britain and whose autocratic rule is blamed for the country’s economic and political meltdown.

Annan, who is from Ghana, said he was encouraged that democracy had taken root in many African countries in the past decade. He added that leaders must be held accountable to the same rules as ordinary citizens.

“Africans must guard against a pernicious, self-destructive form of racism that unites citizens to rise up and expel tyrannical rulers who are white, but to excuse tyrannical rulers who are black,” he said.

(Associated Press)