A Zimbabwean cabinet minister has accused Britain, helped by the United States, of masterminding the country's cholera outbreak in a "biological chemical war, a genocidal onslaught" against the country.

The accusation was published in the government-controlled Herald newspaper by Sikhanyiso Ndlovu, the information minister in President Robert Mugabe's government.

The newspaper backed up the accusation by suggesting that a statement by a top U.S. official, saying the international community had been preparing for a cholera outbreak for some time, "rais[ed] the fears that her country may have launched biological warfare on Zimbabwe."

In other news on Zimbabwe's cholera outbreak, United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon has repudiated remarks by Mugabe that the cholera outbreak is under control.

"I cannot agree that the cholera epidemic is over," Ban told a news conference in Geneva. "The reports I have been receiving ... are alarming," he said. "There are still many people who are suffering from this epidemic."