|
|
 |
|
CNS Story:
|
ZIMBABWE-RICARD Jun-27-2005 (370 words) With photos posted June 17 and 20. xxxi
U.S. bishop condemns wave of demolitions in Zimbabwe
By Stephen Steele
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The international community should pressure Zimbabwe's government to stop a widely criticized wave of shantytown demolitions that has left hundreds of thousands homeless, said the head of the U.S. bishops' international policy committee.
Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Fla., also called on Zimbabwe to provide "shelter, food and full restitution of property and other losses" to the people displaced by the government's Operation Drive Out Trash.
"We urge the government of Zimbabwe to facilitate the efforts of those organizations, including those sponsored by the church, to provide humanitarian and development assistance to the poor and defenseless," Bishop Ricard said in a June 24 statement released in Washington.
Zimbabwe's government said the demolitions were carried out to eliminate illegal settlements that had contributed to a rise in crime in Zimbabwe's deteriorating cities, but Bishop Ricard said the reasons the government offered "cannot justify the cruel violence visited by the authorities on peaceful and innocent people."
The bishop said the government's actions violated the "dignity of the human person."
"The violence that resulted in the denial of food and shelter is a perversion of governmental authority, since the common good is the reason that political authority exists," the bishop said.
Zimbabwe's bishops also have condemned the five-week-old campaign, calling it a "gross injustice done to the poor."
In separate statements, Archbishop Robert Ndlovu of Zimbabwe's capital, Harare, and Archbishop Pius Ncube of Bulawayo, a frequent government critic, also spoke against the action and against Zimbabwe's longtime President Robert Mugabe.
On June 24, Archbishop Ncube called for Mugabe's arrest and prosecution. Speaking from the Vatican, Archbishop Ncube said that Zimbabwe's government sought to drive its opposition back to the famine-hit countryside for political re-education, as the Pol Pot regime did in Cambodia in the 1970s.
The government operation has left between 200,000 and 1.5 million Zimbabweans without homes or livelihoods, The Associated Press reported June 27. Opposition political groups said the campaign was aimed at punishing those who voted against the ruling party in recent parliamentary elections.
An envoy for U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan arrived in Harare June 27 to investigate the government campaign and possible human rights violations.
END
Copyright (c) 2005 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
CNS · 3211 Fourth St NE · Washington DC 20017 · 202.541.3250
|
|
|
|
