(NEWZIMBABWE) Blair calls for Mugabe's overthrow

COMMENT - Actually, many people in Zimbabwe have died because of what you have done, or have failed to do, Tony. You thought you could save the British taxpayer 2 billion pounds by finding excuses to renege on your obligation to compensate white farmers for land reform, which was the British obligation under the Lancaster House Agreement. And when the Zimbabwean government didn't let landreform rest, and instituted it's own Fast Track program in response, you set out to destroy the Zimbabwean economy, with your buddy George Bush, and created the Zimbawean Democracy and Economic Recovery Act of 2001, which put a credit freeze on the country of Zimbabwe. So rather than talk tough, you should get ready to compensate Zimbabwe for the damage you have done.

Blair calls for Mugabe's overthrow
by Daniel Misi
22/07/2009 00:00:00

TONY Blair believes that Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe should be overthrown, a German magazine quoted the former British Prime Minister as saying in an interview published on Wednesday.

"I think if you can get rid of Mugabe, get rid of him. The guy has destroyed his country. There are many people in his country who have died who should not have died, because of what he has done," Blair told the Stern weekly.

"My idea of foreign policy is that if you can do something, you should do it. But of course you have to operate carefully within precise boundaries."

The timing of Blair’s comments is interesting – coming after Mugabe and rivals Morgan Tsvangirai and Arthur Mutambara formed a coalition government in February which is holding.

As Prime Minister from May 1997 to June 2007, Blair presided over a chill in relations between Britain and Zimbabwe – coinciding with Zimbabwe’s take-over of farms from white land owners, many of whom had British ancestry.

Under Blair, Britain led an international push for punitive sanctions on Zimbabwe. Mugabe said the strategy was to effect “illegal regime change” by constricting his country’s economy.

In June 2008, a year after Blair left office, it was reported that Britain’s Ministry of Defence had two separate contingency plans for military action in Zimbabwe, although the government insisted at the time that intervention was not “a plausible course”.

The Times reported that one plan involved the deployment of troops into Zimbabwe to resolve a humanitarian crisis. The other was to provide military support if a national evacuation order to help British residents to leave the country was implemented.

But Lord Carrington, the former Foreign Secretary, who led the negotiations that brought white rule in Rhodesia to an end, paving the way for the birth of Zimbabwe, said a military strategy would not work.

Lord Carrington said: “Any military intervention by the British would be regarded – not just by Zimbabwe but by all the neighbouring African countries – as a return to colonisation.”

And Lord Malloch-Brown, who was Foreign Office Minister in 2008, said: “It’s not a plausible course and would not enjoy international support. I have not heard anyone here or in any other capital suggest military action is a solution.”