HARARE—Zimbabwe denounced the Group of Eight rich nations on Wednesday for planning sanctions on top officials, saying it was part of a colonial and racist move led by Britain and the United States to install a puppet government.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said at the G8 summit in Japan that a draft U.N. resolution calling for sanctions on President Robert Mugabe's government would include an arms embargo and financial and travel restrictions on 14 officials.
"We condemn this colonial and racist campaign against our country and government, but we are also very cognisant that it is Britain and the United States who are leading this campaign whose ultimate goal is to have their puppets in power," Zimbabwean Information Minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu said.
The two Western allies successfully lobbied their G8 partners at the summit this week to impose sanctions on Zimbabwe's leadership for holding a violent June 27 presidential poll boycotted by opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai.
They say Mugabe's re-election was a sham and want the U.N. Security Council to follow their lead in punishing the 84-year-old ruler. Washington and other Western countries are pushing for the 15-nation council to vote for sanctions this week.
"There should be no safe haven and no hiding place for the criminal cabal that now make up the Mugabe regime," Brown told a media conference at the end of the G8 summit of rich countries.
Ndlovu said the issue did not belong in the council because Zimbabwe was not a threat to world peace and security—the same line as taken by South Africa.
Zimbabwean Foreign Minister Simbarashe Mumbengegwi said during a visit to Burkina Faso that the government was ready to start talks with the opposition on the formation of a unity government including all parties.
"I am convinced that we'll reach modalities that will be accepted by everyone," he said late on Tuesday.
But he also fiercely criticised the West for preparing sanctions.
"Zimbabwe has had free and fair elections ... it's the voice of the Zimbabwean people which counts. We can't receive instructions from our former colonial masters. We are an independent country and we will never, never go back to being a colony," Mumbengegwi said.
Security Council Vote
The United States and France say there are enough council members to pass the resolution but it is likely to face stiff resistance from veto-wielding nations China and Russia, who generally support the South African position.
Although Russia signed onto the G8 statement, Moscow has expressed misgivings about sanctions, which are also opposed by most African nations.
Tsvangirai, the leader of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change, won a first round poll on March 29 but fell short of the absolute majority needed for outright victory.
He withdrew six days before the run-off election because of violence by pro-Mugabe militias which the MDC said killed 103 of its supporters.
Mugabe blames his opponents for the bloodshed.
There is wide international consensus on the need for negotiations to solve the impasse, which threatens to deepen the economic crisis in Zimbabwe.
The country is suffering food and fuel shortages and the world's worst inflation rate of at least 2 million percent.
But there is sharp disagreement as to the framework of talks, with Western powers and Tsvangirai demanding the March elections be used as the basis for negotiations and Mugabe saying the opposition must accept his re-election.
MDC Secretary-General Tendai Biti told the South African Broadcasting Corporation that the party was not willing to speak to Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF as long as the June 27 result was allowed to stand.
"To be able to sanitise that grand robbery, that grand kleptocracy will never happen," Biti said in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Tsvangirai says the opposition will not participate in negotiations until Mugabe's government halts the violence against his supporters and accepts his victory in March.
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