US Draft Resolution calls for Sanctions against Mugabe

By Rick Moran

Well, it's a start.

The US will introduce a UN Security Council resolution condemning recent events in Zimbabwe and calls for sanctions on the government while demanding that President Robert Mugabe begin talks with the opposition:

The draft resolution would freeze the financial assets of Robert Mugabe and 11 other Zimbabwean officials and ban them from traveling if adopted by the U.N. Security Council.

The U.S., European nations and Australia already have imposed limited sanctions on Zimbabwe.

Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai won the most votes in the first round of presidential voting in March, but not the simple majority needed to avoid a runoff.

Tsvangirai later withdrew from the runoff citing attacks on his supporters. Mugabe held the vote anyway and was declared the winner Sunday.

As usual, the only sticking point will be China who seems to now have charted a course to block anything we propose at the United Nations. Let's hope they will take a hint and politely abstain while the rest of the world goes about the business of trying to rid ourselves o Mugabe.

I found some of the comments on my last Zimbabwe post interesting in that some of our AT readers believe it is the fault of the United States that Mugabe is a thug. With this kind of reasoning, I'm surprised some of these commenters don't blame the US when a mosquito sneezes in Madagascar and a hurricane blows up in the Gulf. That kind of tortured, illogical reasoning proves a knee jerk anti-Americanism among some of our commenters and I was glad to see others rake them over the coals for that kind of stupidity.