ZIMBABWE: The Zimbabwean president, Mr Robert Mugabe, has accused Britain, Australia and New Zealand of forging an unholy alliance against him and says Zimbabwe's future in the Commonwealth would depend on respect for its independence.
In a state-of-the-nation address, yesterday, Mr Mugabe told parliament that his embattled government was working to build an "alternative global power point" - including China - because a unipolar political order led by the United States was unjust.
His remarks, preceding the annual Commonwealth summit in Nigeria later this week, follow comments last Friday suggesting that Zimbabwe may leave the group from which it had been suspended altogether if the price of being readmitted was to give up sovereignty.
"Our membership of the Commonwealth, itself a mere club, is dependent on this fundamental consideration, currently being vitiated by Britain, Australia and New Zealand, the Anglo-Saxon unholy alliance against Zimbabwe," he said, sparking a round of applause in a parliament dominated by his ruling ZANU-PF party.
Zimbabwe was suspended from the 54-nation Commonwealth last year after Mr Mugabe was accused of rigging his own re-election. He has not been invited to the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Abuja in Nigeria from December 5th-8th.
Elsewhere in Harare yesterday, state lawyers who accuse the main opposition leader of plotting to kill Mr Mugabe sought to amend the allegations against him as his treason trial resumed after a two-month break.
If convicted, Mr Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), could face the death penalty.
Judge Paddington Garwe in the High Court reserved ruling on the application and adjourned the trial to an unspecified date.
The state's original case held that Mr Tsvangirai took part in three meetings related to the plot, including one in Canada where he asked a Montreal-based political consultancy firm to arrange Mr Mugabe's assassination and effect a military coup.
However state prosecutor Mr Joseph Musakwa said his team wished to amend the alleged content of the meeting in December 2001, saying it focused on "transitional arrangements after the assassination".