Tsvangirai sets New Year’s Day deadline

[admin]

Tsvangirai sets New Year’s Day deadline
« Thread Started on Dec 19, 2008, 11:26am »

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tsvangirai sets New Year’s Day deadline
Posted: 07:06 AM ET
HARARE, Zimbabwe (CNN) — The man who would be Zimbabwe’s prime minister
under a power-sharing agreement said Friday his party would withdraw from
efforts to implement the unity government unless 42 members of his party who
have been kidnapped are freed by New Year’s Day.

The threat comes as President Mugabe apologized to Zimbabweans for the
economic crisis that lead Zimbabwe’s central bank on Friday to introduce a $10
billion note worth less than 20 U.S. dollars.

Morgan Tsvangirai said Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party have “willfully and
repeatedly broken the letter and the spirit” of the agreement signed in
September, while his Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) party has “shown
patience, political maturity and willingness to make significant concessions.”

“The regime is conducting a deliberate and targeted national terror
campaign to undermine the MDC’s support within Zimbabwe and the work of the
pro-democracy and human rights organizations,” Tsvangirai said in a speech
delivered Friday in Gaborone, Botswana.

Tsvangirai said unless the kidnappings end and all 42 abductees are
either released or brought to court to face formal charges by January 1, 2009,
he would ask his party’s national council to suspend all talks and contact with
ZANU-PF.