http://www.abcnews.go.com/wire/World/reuters19991220_915.html
WIRE: 12/20/1999 08:06:00 ET
Mugabe says U.S., Canada asked him to take Mengistu
HARARE, Dec 20 (Reuters) - Zimbabwe
President Robert Mugabe was quoted as
saying on Monday that the United States
and Canada asked him to give political
asylum to former Ethiopian strongman
Mengistu Haile Mariam when he fled to
Harare in 1991.
In an interview in Zimbabwe's official
Herald newspaper, Mugabe said the U.S.
and Canadian governments offered to help his government
look after Mengistu, who is accused of serious human rights
violations during his 17-year rule.
Mugabe said that while Zimbabwe was being accused of
"harbouring the genocide fugtive," there was no mention of
the role played by both the United States and Canada.
"Both the Americans and Canadians even offered to assist
financially if we could not meet the expenses of looking after
Mengistu," he said.
"We have not received a cent because we have not
requested their assistance. He (Mengistu) helped a lot of the
continent's liberation movements," Mugabe added.
Mengistu was in the headlines earlier this month when
Ethiopia sent a request for his extradition to South Africa,
where he had gone for treatment for stomach ulcers. He
returned to Zimbabwe just before the request was received.
Mugabe said he agreed to take in Mengistu, who was
accused of waging a "red terror" while in power in Ethiopia,
to help end a bloody civil war there.
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. and Canada
embassies in Harare on Mugabe's comments.
The government has said in the past it gave refuge to
Mengistu because he helped train and arm guerrillas of
Mugabe's ZANU-PF movement during Zimbabwe's war
for black majority rule in the 1970s.
MUGABE ON MENGISTU'S TRIP TO SOUTH AFRICA
On Mengistu's recent problems in South Africa, Mugabe said
he had failed to persuade the former Ethiopian leader to go to
Cuba for medical treatment.
"I suspect someone in South Africa leaked the information
(about his presence), hence the noise," he said.
Mugabe said although Mengistu had committed crimes
during his tenure as head of state, he was entitled to political
refuge like other leaders.
Zimbabwe offered Mengistu asylum on the same conditions
that the United States accepted former Filipino president
Ferdinand Marcos -- that he has no public role and no
future political involvement.
Mengistu has lived in a heavily-guarded Harare mansion
since fleeing Ethiopia in 1991 just before rebels took over.
He was a leader of a group of radical soldiers took power in
1974 after overthrowing Emperor Haile Selassie.
After a violent internal power struggle he became head of
state in 1977.
He launched a "Red Terror" campaign against rival Marxist
factions, and thousands of people were killed over the next
two years. Addis Ababa has accused him of genocide and
crimes against humanity. Mengistu is one of 3,000 officials
who fled Ethiopia in 1991 and are now being tried in absentia.
