Cablegate: Independent Paper Reacts to Meldrum Expulsion

This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS HARARE 000958

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR AF/PDPA FOR DALTON, MITCHELL AND SIMS
NSC FOR JENDAYI FOR JENDAYI FRAZER
LONDON FOR GURNEY
PARIS FOR NEARY
NAIROBI FOR PFLAUMER

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PREL PHUM KPAO KMDR ZI
SUBJECT: INDEPENDENT PAPER REACTS TO MELDRUM EXPULSION

1. Under headline "Iron fist will fail" the
independent daily "The Daily News" dedicated its May
19 editorial to the expulsion of Andrew Meldrum, a
United States national and correspondent for the
British newspaper "The Guardian." The editorial said
Meldrum's ejection was "ill-advised and unlawful" and
that "the government's crude actions will not silence
Meldrum or other journalists." Excerpts follow:

2. "The government of Zimbabwe has yet again
contrived to make an international spectacle of itself
with its ill-advised and unlawful deportation of
Guardian journalist Andrew Meldrum. . . It is tragic
for the nation that the government fails to realize,
or simply does not care, that its iron-fisted response
to its citizen's attempts to express basic rights that
they are guaranteed by the Constitution is fuelling
the tension it prefers, ostrich-like, not to see. . .
Through its deportation of Meldrum, President Robert
Mugabe's regime has merely added to the list of
journalists who are determined to tell the true story
of Zimbabwe, even if they have to do it from beyond
the country's borders. The government's crude actions
will not silence Meldrum or other journalists. . . ."

WHITEHEAD

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