WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.
Original Post Date: 2008-04-19 Time: 00:00:00 Posted By: Jan
By Deon de Lange
The world’s parliamentarians have issued their strongest condemnation yet of the electoral crisis in Zimbabwe, saying further delays in releasing results can only be “detrimental to the crumbling credibility of the process”.
The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), which held its 118th assembly in Cape Town this week, on Friday approved a “presidential statement” on Zimbabwe that called for all restrictions on freedom of assembly and speech to be lifted. “We are deeply concerned that almost three weeks after elections were held in Zimbabwe, results have not been fully released. We call for their immediate publication.”
The statement further implies the recent election may not have been free and fair, saying the people of that country “have a right to determine their future through free and fair elections as enshrined in universally accepted norms and standards governing democratic elections”.
The IPU also urged “all parliaments – as institutions of democracy and oversight – to continue to exert their influence until this matter is resolved in its entirety”.
This position will make it difficult for South African Speaker Baleka Mbete, who served as president of the assembly, to deny South African opposition party requests for a debate on Zimbabwe when Parliament reconvenes next week.
The ANC has consistently refused to debate the situation in Zimbabwe since a parliamentary observer mission declared the 2003 elections in that country to be “free and fair”.
This view was contradicted by DA members on the same mission who issued a minority report to the contrary – as they did when the recent Southern African Development Community (SADC) mission similarly declared the Zimbabwean election to have been a “fair reflection of the will of the people”.
The IPU presidential statement comes as a double blow to the Zimbabwean delegation, led by parliamentary secretary Austin Zvoma.
Presenting its report to the assembly, the IPU committee on the human rights of parliamentarians cited “gross human rights abuses” relating to arrests, torture and illegal detention of a number of opposition MPs over the past years.