JOHANNESBURG — An outraged U.N. torture investigator said Thursday he believes Zimbabwe's president may be the reason he was blocked from the country, a move that could further isolate the struggling nation.
Manfred Nowak had planned to investigate alleged attacks on Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai's supporters by militants linked to President Robert Mugabe's ZANU-PF party. Mugabe, who has been in power for nearly three decades, is accused of trampling on human rights and democracy.
"There are certainly some parts of the government who do not want me to assess the current conditions of torture," Nowak told reporters in Johannesburg upon arrival from Zimbabwe.
"There are strong indications that this was not just done by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs without at least the knowledge or instruction by President Mugabe," Nowak said later at a news conference.
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Ephraim Masawi, a spokesman for Mugabe's ZANU-PF party, said angrily that allegations Mugabe was involved in barring Nowak were "not true."
Nowak said he had a meeting scheduled Thursday with Tsvangirai, even though other Zimbabwean officials had told him he was not welcome. Tsvangirai, a longtime opposition leader, joined the government with Mugabe in February, but withdrew temporarily from Cabinet earlier this month after accusing Mugabe's party of human-rights violations.
Nowak called his treatment a "serious diplomatic incident" as well as alarming evidence of the split in the coalition that Tsvangirai has called the only way to rescue Zimbabwe from economic ruin and violent political impasse. Nowak said the coalition could fail, which would mean new balloting in a country with a history of election violence blamed on Mugabe's supporters.
Jean Ziegler, who advises the United Nations on human-rights issues, said the U.N. Secretary-General could — and should — ask U.N. aid and development agencies to curtail cooperation with Zimbabwe in response to the "scandalous" treatment of Nowak.
Ziegler, who has previously served as a U.N. special investigator, known as a rapporteur, said failing to respond strongly to what happened to Nowak could inspire "any other lawless state" to behave similarly.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon "is disappointed" that Nowak was denied entry to Zimbabwe and supports the High Commissioner for Human Rights' call for the government to provide "full access" to all human-rights entities and investigators, U.N. spokeswoman Michele Montas said at U.N. headquarters in New York.
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