Cape Town — More than five months after Zimbabwe's Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) beat the ruling Zanu-PF into second place in elections, the country's major political parties have reached an agreement to share power.

President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa confirmed at a news conference in Harare on Thursday night, Zimbabwe time, that "a unanimous agreement, arrived at without any reservation by all the negotiating parties" had been concluded. The news conference was broadcast in South Africa on satellite television.

Mbeki - appointed as facilitator of the talks by the Southern African Development Community - spoke soon after the news agency Agence France-Presse quoted MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai as emerging from talks to tell journalists: "We've got a deal." Reuters quoted a Zimbabwe government source as confirming the deal.

Mbeki said Zimbabwe's leaders would spend the coming days constituting what he called "an inclusive government." A formal signing ceremony would be held in Harare on Monday, when details of the agreement would be publicly released. He said he believed it was "inevitable" that the agreement would succeed "because it's made in Zimbabwe and owned by Zimbabwe's people... The rest of the world needs to respect that."

Questioned by a journalist on his role in the Zimbabwe talks, Mbeki defended himself: "We have never paid any particular attention to criticisms about so-called quiet diplomacy. All diplomacy is quiet. If it isn't quiet, then it's not diplomacy, it's something else."

He flew to Harare earlier this week to preside over renewed talks for a government of national unity. The talks focussed on how executive powers would be shared between Tsvangirai, who is expected to become prime minister, and President Robert Mugabe, who has ruled for 28 years.

Earlier on Thursday, Mugabe was quoted as telling a meeting in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city: "We have not gone anywhere. We are still stuck at the same point where those from the MDC still want to govern."