U.S. sanctions Zimbabwe leaders for political, economic, human rights abuses

Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa addressing a crowd at a campaign rally at Sakubva Stadium in Mutare in May 2018 during elections he promised to be fair and free. On Monday, the U.S. announced further sanctions on Mnangagwa and other top government officials for their pattern of “gross abuses of political, economic and human rights.” File photo by Aaron Ufumeli/EPA-EFE

March 4 (UPI) — The United States on Monday announced a new series of sanctions aimed at top Zimbabwe government officials — including its president and vice president — in response to what the White House called ongoing “gross abuses of political, economic and human rights.”

These new sanctions specifically target three business entities and 11 individuals including Zimbabwe’s President Emmerson Mnangagwa and his wife, Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, Ret. Brigadier General Walter Tapfumaneyi and businessman Kudakwashe Tagwirei “for their involvement in corruption or serious human rights abuse,” according to the department.

“The targeting of civil society and severe restrictions on political activity have stifled fundamental freedoms, while key actors, including government leaders, have siphoned off public resources for personal gains,” the White House said in a statement.

The sanctions came alongside an executive order by President Joe Biden ending a national emergency in Zimbabwe and revoking a past order authorizing Zimbabwe-specific sanctions and transitioning to new sanctions under the Global Magnitsky Program.

“The United States remains deeply concerned about democratic backsliding, human rights abuses, and government corruption in Zimbabwe,” said Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Wally Adeyemo, who said Zimbabwe’s president and his “criminal network of government officials and businesspeople who are most responsible for corruption or human rights abuse against the people of Zimbabwe.”

“These changes to our approach provide an opportunity for the government of Zimbabwe to undertake key reforms to improve its record on human rights, good governance and anti-corruption,” he added.

The United States previously placed sanctions on Mnangagwa and others in December 2022. But while the fresh sanctions announced Monday again target mostly government officials and their counterparts, the Biden administration emphasized that these sanctions “do not represent sanctions on Zimbabwe or its public” with a population of over 15 million civilians in the southern part of Africa.

The United States said that in Zimbabwe Mnangagwa and his security forces “have engaged in the violent repression of political activists and civil society organizations.”

In November, Zimbabwe opposition party activist Tapfumaneyi Masaya was found dead on a roadside after being abducted while campaigning ahead of a special election in what was the second in a series of abductions which targeted members of the opposing Citizens Coalition for Change party.

Mnangagwa’s August 2022 re-election was called fraudulent by the opposing political party and by the United States, who say that election “was marred by fraud, the deployment of groups who intimidated voters, and the use of government-organized ‘ferret teams,'” which was made up of intelligence, police and military personnel and other officials.

“Abductees report being pushed into vehicles, beaten and stripped naked, injected with unknown substances, threatened with retaliation, and later dumped on the roadside outside of Harare,” according to the Treasury Department, which added that in 2019, “ferret teams” had “reportedly abducted and assaulted more than 50 people” and that “opposition supporters also claim to have been tortured by security officials, including being stripped, beaten, and whipped at a Zimbabwe Republic Police station.”

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