British Government Continues Persecution of Zimbabwe

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British Government Continues Persecution of Zimbabwe

Racist and Inhuman Treatment of Ahmadi Family

Israeli Army Threatens Further Collective Punishment

The government has once again launched an attack on Zimbabwe and its president. This follows the recent announcement by the Zimbabwean government that it would be stepping up its policy of land acquisition and resettlement in order to redress the imbalances in land ownership, which are a direct consequence of almost a century of British colonial rule. Zimbabwe only finally achieved political independence in 1980.

On Tuesday, Peter Hain, the Minister of State at the Foreign Office, published an article in The Times newspaper. In it he condemned the government of Zimbabwe for what he referred to as "state organised violence" and blamed its president, Robert Mugabe, not only for the country’s economic problems but also for a drought that is affecting the whole of southern Africa. Hain, who made similar comments in an interview broadcast on BBC Radio 4, claimed that "hundreds of white commercial owners and tens of thousands of black workers face being forced off their farms in Zimbabwe by government decree" and that more "refugees" would soon be arriving in Britain from Zimbabwe.

During the last three years the British government and monopoly-controlled media have launched an unprecedented campaign of threats and interference, economic and other sanctions and disinformation against Zimbabwe. Peter Hain acknowledged that the British government has played the leading role in an international campaign to impose sanctions against Zimbabwe, which has been supported by the US and the EU. Zimbabwe has also been suspended from the Commonwealth, following elections held in March this year, in which Britain and its allies blatantly interfered and which were then asserted to be not "free and fair". Britain and the "international community", acting through the IMF and other financial institutions, have also done everything to destabilise Zimbabwe’s economy, so that what was once one of Africa’s most developed economies is now one of the world’s fastest-shrinking economies, contracting at a rate of over 10% per year.

The British government wishes to present itself as one of Zimbabwe’s "oldest friends", a philanthropic donor eager to provide aid and assist land reform. But the fact is that the successive British governments have refused, on one pretext or another, to honour their historical obligations, as the former colonial power, to fund land redistribution, as required under the terms of the Lancaster House Agreement of 1980. Current "humanitarian aid" is being openly used to undermine the government of Zimbabwe, while the British government says nothing of the compensation and reparations due to the people of Zimbabwe for the crimes committed during nearly a hundred years of British colonial rule. These crimes commenced with and were based upon the theft of land from the peoples of that country.

The British government is attempting to dictate how Zimbabwe should run its internal affairs as if it were still the colonial master. In the context of the "new scramble for Africa" it is using every means to impose its diktat and wishes to dominate this entire region of the African continent. However, its aim has always been to attempt to build an "international consensus" so that Britain does not appear so openly in this reactionary colonialist role. At the present time it aims to encourage "an African solution" to the situation in Zimbabwe, by encouraging South Africa and other countries to intervene and act under the terms of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NePAD). NePAD incorporates Eurocentric values of "good governance" which Britain and the other big powers can manipulate to serve their own economic and strategic aims. At the same time it is presenting the view that "change can only come from within Zimbabwe", openly encouraging political opposition to the government of that country from forces that it has previously financed and supported.

The British government must be condemned for its continued attacks on Zimbabwe, which are reaching a fever pitch of viciousness. They show the true venom of the British government in the face of a state that refuses to conform to the Anglo-American definition of the "international community". As with much of Africa, the desperate problems which the people face are being laid by the British government on the regimes of that continent. The government does not have double but many standards, which it follows in pursuit of its own economic and strategic interests. Thus, while trying to isolate Zimbabwe to the maximum, it is seeking to woo Libya and is trying to appear as an ameliorating force when it comes to US aggression against Iraq. But these apparent disparate tactics have one common factor – the intervention up to and including armed aggression in sovereign states on a "civilising" mission, behind which stands the financial oligarchy. What must be demanded by workers and all democratic people is that Britain get out of Africa once and for all, and end its policy of interference and intervention around the globe in pursuit of its strategic aim of "Making Britain Great Again".

The deportation of the Ahmadi family to Germany demonstrates once again that the British government's asylum policy is based on racist and inhuman criteria.

The family was returned to Germany, their first point of claiming asylum within the EU, on Wednesday after being refused asylum in Britain. They had previously been the subject of a terrifying, violent and provocative raid on a Birmingham mosque after 5 am prayers.

Friends of the family accused the government of trying to score political points by turning them into asylum scapegoats.

Elane Heffernan, a spokesman for the Committee to Defend Asylum Seekers, said the Ahmadi children had been "taken from a place of safety and placed in terror" in order to send out a message that the government is tough on illegal immigrants. Elane Heffernan accused the Home Secretary of "legalised child abuse", and added, "It is racist and inhumane."

"The whole thing is basically a publicity stunt for the government in an attempt to convince the British people that they are in control of asylum," Elane Heffernan said. "There were leaked memos from Downing Street just after the French elections which said they wanted to have televised deportations and gunboats in the Mediterranean to stop refugee boats."

The Minister for Immigration, Beverley Hughes, made a statement in which she said that the family were removed "in accordance with UK and international law".

There is no doubt that the government was acting within the letter of the law, and that it is doing so highlights the problem. The attitude of the minister of state and the British government can be gauged by the contemptuous use of the term "asylum shopping" to describe the behaviour of the family and others like them. The government is not viewing people seeking asylum like the Ahmadi family as human beings with rights, but because the government ministers can find laws to justify their actions, they have nothing further to say. This action further emphasises that the government constantly applies racist criteria to who is allowed entry into Britain, and acts with arbitrary authority unrestricted by any constitutional guarantee of rights of persons, whether they be citizens or residents or classed as "asylum shoppers".

On Tuesday, Israeli soldiers distributed what was called "an important announcement to the Palestinian citizens", which threatened more acts of collective punishment against Palestinian civilians.

Throughout the last two years the Israeli army has endlessly used aggressive measures to collectively punish Palestinians, and now they are threatening further actions.

The flyer, which was distributed in the Amari refugee camp, states that anyone who assists, or co-operates, or has any knowledge of a suicide attack in Israel will "be severely punished".

And for the first time, Israel is organising the removal of three relatives – the brother and sister of a man alleged to been behind a bombing in Tel Aviv, and the brother of a Hamas activist suspected of organising an attack on a bus whose passengers were Israeli "settlers". The issue is being appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court.

This move is another element of repression of the Palestinian people. Ahmed Abdel-Rahman, one of Yasser Arafat's aides, said: "This is a declaration of the bankruptcy of Israel's military solution and reoccupation."

Furthermore, the recent attacks on innocent members of the families of those who attacked Israelis are apparently only the tip of the iceberg. The threatening announcement distributed by the IDF went on to say: "Know that destroying houses of these people and the removal of members of their families who helped carrying out the attacks to Gaza is only one of the many steps the IDF is carrying out against anyone who had any part in an attack."

The last line directly threatens Palestinians: "Stop proving any help or co-operation with the attackers in order to guarantee your safety, and the safety of your family and property."

And by seeking the expulsion from the West Bank to Gaza of relatives suspected of helping Palestinian bombers and gunmen, Israel has opened a new front in its war of attrition.

The legality of the Israeli action in international law is strongly contested, but Israel is basing its justification on an old British law, the Defence (Emergency) Regulations, 1945, introduced when Britain held the UN mandate for Palestine. This law allowed for deportations "for reasons of security" but limited the powers to "the most extreme cases". Israel inherited the law from Jordan, it claims, when it took over the West Bank and Gaza in 1967.

Palestinian Authority leader Yasser Arafat described the Israeli actions as "a crime against international and humanitarian law".

The doctrine of "collective punishment" which deliberately targets a collective of innocent people is a well-documented Hitlerite programme carried out in "reprisal" for acts of resistance. It is illegal under international law and a breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Article 49 states: "Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive."