Zimbabwe to head UN commission

UNITED NATIONS – Zimbabwe has been elected to head a key UN environmental commission despite opposition from western countries that say the country has badly mismanaged its own resources.

Accused of ruining its own economy and under sanctions for human rights abuses, Zimbabwe was nevertheless elected by a 26-21 vote late Friday and will replace Qatar as the head of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, the United Nations press service said on Saturday. The group meets annually and is responsible for following up on the 1992 Rio Summit in which the world’s leaders painted a grim picture of environmental ills and set out plans to cure them.”Zimbabwe’s election will be seen as an outrage by millions of people who look to the United Nations for help to escape from poverty,” Ian Pearson, Britain’s Minister for Climate Change and the Environment, said after the vote.”They will be asking how the body charged with promoting sustainable development will be able to maintain credibility whilst being chaired by a representative of a government whose failed policies have destroyed its own economy.”How can a once food-rich country where 1.8 million people now depend on food aid be expected to give its authority to the UN’s work on critical issues such as agriculture, rural development and land use?” Relations between Harare and London deteriorated following President Robert Mugabe’s launch of controversial land reform in 2000 that saw the state seizing land from white farmers, many of whom hold British passports.The government doled the parcels out to landless blacks who often had no skills in crop management, causing output to plummet and creating food scarcity.Mugabe and his ministers routinely blame an economic meltdown on targeted sanctions imposed on them by Washington and the European Union following the 2002 presidential polls which the opposition says were rigged.Zimbabwe’s once-model economy is in tatters with four-digit inflation, spiralling unemployment, an acute shortage of food and essential goods, and an 80 per cent poverty rate.Nampa-AFPThe group meets annually and is responsible for following up on the 1992 Rio Summit in which the world’s leaders painted a grim picture of environmental ills and set out plans to cure them.”Zimbabwe’s election will be seen as an outrage by millions of people who look to the United Nations for help to escape from poverty,” Ian Pearson, Britain’s Minister for Climate Change and the Environment, said after the vote.”They will be asking how the body charged with promoting sustainable development will be able to maintain credibility whilst being chaired by a representative of a government whose failed policies have destroyed its own economy.”How can a once food-rich country where 1.8 million people now depend on food aid be expected to give its authority to the UN’s work on critical issues such as agriculture, rural development and land use?” Relations between Harare and London deteriorated following President Robert Mugabe’s launch of controversial land reform in 2000 that saw the state seizing land from white farmers, many of whom hold British passports.The government doled the parcels out to landless blacks who often had no skills in crop management, causing output to plummet and creating food scarcity.Mugabe and his ministers routinely blame an economic meltdown on targeted sanctions imposed on them by Washington and the European Union following the 2002 presidential polls which the opposition says were rigged.Zimbabwe’s once-model economy is in tatters with four-digit inflation, spiralling unemployment, an acute shortage of food and essential goods, and an 80 per cent poverty rate.Nampa-AFP