Presseurop |

Denmark | Artistic asylum for Zimbabwean writer

Wed, 16 Jun 2010 17:18:53 +0100

Tendai Frank Tagarira arrived in Århus on 15 June, reports the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten. Fleeing death threats after his autobiography Trying to Make Sense of It came out last year, the 26-year-old Zimbabwean writer has been granted safe haven in Denmark’s second-largest city for two years. Århus, like many other Danish towns, is a “free city”, i.e. a member of the International Cities of Refuge Network (ICORN) created in 1994 on the International Parliament of Writers’ initiative. The 30 participating cities worldwide pledge to host and provide for foreign writers in exile for a period of one or two years.

(News in brief)

Democratisation | EU too soft on hardline regimes

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 14:43:10 +0100

“Europe’s attempt to base foreign policy on ethical considerations is liable to come a cropper,” opines the Tagesspiegel, citing Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and Libya as cases in point. Libya has huge fossil fuel deposits, of which everyone wants a piece – and human rights be damned, as long as the EU “at least makes rhetorical entreaties for respect for human rights and democratic standards in its dealings with Afghanistan and Zimbabwe”. Its timid stance on the old dictator Robert Mugabe, however, is puzzling to say the least: the EU is actually planning to re-allocate the entire development aid package earmarked for Zimbabwe, “even if human rights advocates and opposition party members are still being tortured”. As to Hamid Karzai’s administration, moreover, the EU “will have a hard time explaining why we are funding the organisation of elections in Afghanistan with European taxpayers’ money without there being the slightest consequences in the wake of widespread election fraud,” observes the Berlin daily. According to the Tagesspiegel, “in terms of realpolitik, there are clearly some good reasons for working together” with these governments, “but we should at least admit that our attempts at democratisation have failed.”

(News in brief)

Illegal trade | Diamonds are Mugabe's best friend

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:31:34 +0100

Six years after having begun the Kimberley process, an international initiative destined to prevent funding of wars in Africa by means of the diamond trade, The Independent is sounding alarm bells. Quoting Ian Smillie, the Canadian behind the process, the London daily reports that Kimberley control mechanisms "no longer works" and that diamond trafficking is "flourishing in Ivory Coast, Guinea, Venezuela and Lebanon". Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe is the most cause for concern, where "hundreds of diamond miners were massacred by the army as the government effectively militarised a key mining area late last year." While experts estimate that blood diamonds account for "a fraction of one per cent of the international trade in diamonds, compared to estimates of up to 15% in the 1990s", there are fears that impending "collapse" of the government and industry "safety net" threatens this breakthrough.

(News in brief)