Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Foreign Affairs. Will the minister update the House on developments in Zimbabwe? What action is Australia and the international community taking in response to recent reports of the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe?

Stephen Smith (Perth, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for his question. The Australian government condemns absolutely the campaign of intimidation, violence and fear by the brutal Mugabe regime against the people of Zimbabwe. We condemn it absolutely. Following the first round of the presidential and parliamentary elections in Zimbabwe we saw the Mugabe regime seek to rort that election by rorting the count. Now, in the second round of presidential elections—the presidential run-off—we see the Mugabe regime seeking to rort that election by violence and intimidation. Yesterday we saw that culminate in reports of Mr Mugabe saying that, even if he were not successful through intimidation, fear and violence in rorting that election, he would, in any event, proceed to ignore the will of the Zimbabwe people and use violence to ignore it if he so decided.

For some time the Australian government has been very concerned about the prospects of a full and free election in Zimbabwe and very concerned about the actions of the regime. There is an array of evidence to show that this is a campaign of violence. The leader of the opposition, the leader of the MDC, Mr Tsvangirai, has been arrested now some five times. The Secretary-General of the opposition party, Mr Tendai Biti, has been under detention for about 72 hours. There is clearly a campaign of state sponsored violence in rural and regional areas and, outrageously, there has been a suspension of humanitarian assistance through non-government organisations, including a suspension of food aid through the World Food Program.

Having said that, there are some initiatives which the government has welcomed. Election observers, which were provided by the South African Development Community states, have in recent times been increased from the number at the first ballot to 130, with undertakings by the South African Development Community states that that will be increased to 400. Today the UN Assistant Secretary for Political Affairs, Haile Menkerios, is due to arrive in Zimbabwe. This follows a conversation between Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary-General, and Mr Mugabe at the Food and Agriculture Organisation High Level Conference on Food Security in Rome, which I attended a couple of weeks ago. In discussions between the Secretary-General and Mr Mugabe it was agreed that the UN Assistant Secretary would attend. I hope he is given full and free access to put his view about the campaign of intimidation and violence and have full access so far as election observers are concerned.

By way of aside I make the point that it was, frankly, an obscenity that Mr Mugabe attended the food conference in Rome. Here is a person who, when he became leader of his country, inherited one of the world’s premier agricultural countries. He has now seen that devastated and now deliberately uses food and food aid as a political weapon against his own people.

The Australian government continues with its diplomatic efforts. We have raised these issues with the South African Development Community nation states, with African Union states, with the United Kingdom—as I did with Foreign Secretary Miliband when I was in the United Kingdom recently—and with the new Commonwealth Secretary-General. We have indicated that we are happy to make election observers available if so invited, but we are not expecting such an invitation. At the Rome food conference I announced an additional $8 million worth of humanitarian assistance so far as food is concerned, and I indicated yesterday that the government stands ready to give further consideration to adding to the sanctions that it currently has in place so far as travel and financial matters are concerned.

Finally, as the Prime Minister and I said yesterday, the primary responsibility as far as the international community is concerned in efforts to seek to ensure a full, free and fair election in Zimbabwe rests in the first instance on Zimbabwe’s neighbours, the South African Development Community states and the African Union. We again urge those nation states to leave no stone unturned to stop the campaign of violence, intimidation and fear and to allow a full, free and fair expression of the will of the people of Zimbabwe.