Mugabe shrugs off US and British attacks

Zimbabwe’s President Robert Mugabe today dismissed calls by Britain and the US for him to step down as “stupid”.

Mugabe was responding to a weekend announcement by the top US diplomat for Africa that Washington can no longer support a power-sharing proposal that leaves him in charge.

Britain’s Africa minister Lord Malloch-Brown backed the US stance yesterday.

Mugabe said only Zimbabweans could make such a decision.

The US and British comments appear aimed more at Mugabe’s neighbours than him in hope they in turn will pressure the long-time Zimbabwean leader.

But Mugabe’s counterparts are wary of being seen as simply following the West.

Mugabe has drawn African support with claims he is fighting Western imperialists.

"This stupid and foolish thinking'' ignores that only Zimbabweans can make such a decision, Mugabe said at a funeral for a retired army general who had fought British rule in Zimbabwe.

“We are not going to listen to what Bush and Gordon Brown are saying,” Mugabe said. “We do realise that these are the last kicks of a dying horse.”

Mugabe, 84, has ruled the country since its 1980 independence from Britain and refused to leave office following disputed elections in March.

He has faced renewed criticism because of a humanitarian crisis that has pushed millions of Zimbabweans to starvation and spawned a cholera epidemic that has killed more than 1,000 people since August. Food, medicine, fuel and cash are scarce.

Critics blame Mugabe’s policies for the ruin of what had been the region’s breadbasket.

“Zimbabwe’s fate lies in the hands of Zimbabweans,” Mugabe said. “It is the various political parties and the people of Zimbabwe ... who make and unmake governments. It is there decision alone that we go by.”

Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change agreed in September to form a unity government with Mugabe as president and Tsvangirai in the new post of prime minister. The deal, though, has stalled in a dispute over which party would control key Cabinet posts.

The Movement for Democratic Change says it remains committed to talks aimed at making the deal a reality, but also has threatened to withdraw unless political detainees are released or charged by January 1.