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Zimbabwe: Portugal to Invite Country Despite Boycott Threats
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 Published by the government of Zimbabwe |
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The Herald (Harare)
3 November 2007
Posted to the web 3 November 2007
Harare
EUROPEAN Union-Africa Summit host Portugal has stood its ground on inviting Zimbabwe despite boycott threats by Britain and some EU members.
Portuguese Foreign Minister Mr Luis Amado on Wednesday said "every country" in the EU and the African Union would be invited.
Each individual nation, he said, must then determine the level of the delegation it sends.
This follows talks between EU and African Union officials in the Ghanaian capital Accra focusing on Zimbabwe's participation at the summit, provisionally set for December 8 and 9 in Lisbon.
Mr Amado said invitations for the summit -- which Portugal will host in its capacity as current EU president -- would be issued next week.
Britain has said it will boycott the summit if President Mugabe is invited.
Some Scandinavian countries have sympathised with Britain although they have not indicated whether they would stay away from the summit in solidarity with London.
The 14-member Southern African Development Community, which includes Zimbabwe, has said it would boycott the summit if President Mugabe is not invited.
Mr Amado, in an interview with AFP, sought to play down the diplomatic dispute.
"We cannot imagine that every member state will be represented at the highest level," he said, underlining that relations with Africa are not accorded the same importance by all EU member states.
The last EU-Africa Summit was held in Cairo, Egypt, in 2000, while the one planned for 2003 was cancelled after Africa refused to give in to demands to hold the summit minus Zimbabwe.
Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt on Wednesday told the Swedish news agency TT that he was opposed to Cde Mugabe attending, but ruled out a Swedish boycott.
The leaders of Mozambique and Angola, meanwhile, added their voices in support of President Mugabe's attendance.
"We reaffirm our support for the decision taken by the African Union, which demands the unconditional participation of all African countries at the Europe-Africa Summit, including Zimbabwe," Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and Mozambique's Armando Guebuza said in a statement on Wednesday after talks in Maputo.
Top EU and African officials have been meeting in Accra since Monday to discuss the various problems surrounding the summit, where EU and African leaders want climate change, migration and China's growing involvement in Africa to top the agenda.
Ghana is current president of the AU.
Zimbabwe's relations with the West have plummeted since it embarked on a programme of land reforms which saw marginalised black Zimbabweans being allocated land on farms previously owned by a few thousand white commercial farmers.
The EU, the United States and other Western countries have -- at the instigation of Britain -- imposed illegal economic sanctions on Zimbabwe, which are hurting the economy and ordinary Zimbabweans.
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Zimbabwe has said it is not at odds with Europe as a whole but merely Britain, which has reneged on an agreement to fund the land redistribution.
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