Burkina Faso: Demarche on Zimbabwe Talks

C O N F I D E N T I A L OUAGADOUGOU 000694

AF/W FOR EPLUMB, AF/S

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECLASSIFY ON 7/28/2028
TAGS: PREL SADC UV ZI
SUBJECT: Burkina Faso: Demarche on Zimbabwe Talks

Reftel: State 079617

Classified by Charge DBrown for reasons 1.4 (b)(d)


1. (U) Charge presented reftel points to MOFA Cabinet Director
Vincent Zakane on Sunday, July 27.


2. (C) Zakane expressed agreement with several of reftel's points
with one critical difference: while the USG was in favor of a
transitional coalition government between Vice President Mujuru and
opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai allowing Mugabe to leave his
position "with dignity," the Government of Burkina Faso (GOBF)
presently envisaged a coalition government between Mugabe and
Tsvangirai with no presumption that Mugabe would leave government.
Zakane added, however, that the GOBF position regarding a coalition
government in Zimbabwe was still under development.

The Role of African Union in Zimbabwe Crisis: Inconsistencies in
Burkinabe Views
--------------


3. (C) Zakane was somewhat inconsistent regarding the African Union's
(AU) role in assisting to resolve the crisis in Zimbabwe. On the one
hand, Zakane appeared almost dismissive of an important role for the
AU, emphasizing that South African President Thabo Mbeki was the
facilitator for talks (on behalf of the Southern African Development
Community (SADC)),and that AU participation should be clearly
subordinated. (Comment: Zakane may consciously or subconsciously be
making a parallel to Burkina Faso's President, Blaise Compaore, who
as current Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)
President has also been designated as facilitator of the Cote
d'Ivoire peace process. In this context, the AU has had effectively
no substantive role, and even the role of the UN Secretary General's
special representative for Cote d'Ivoire has been very subordinated
to that of Compaore. End comment.)


4. (C) On the other hand, Zakane - as he had done in an earlier
conversation - urged that the United States work through the AU to
gain African support for U.S. positions vis-a-vis Zimbabwe. He again
asserted that the European Union had angered several African
countries by taking positions on Zimbabwe at its recent Africa Summit
in Lisbon (in December 2007) in ways that "ignored the African
Union." Zakane asserted that, should the United States work
exclusively through the UN system without reference to the AU, it
risked creating an impression that non-Africans were dictating to
Africans how they should handle one of the continent's most important
issues. Instead, he advocated, the UN and AU should work together to
"harmonize as much as possible" their respective positions regarding
Zimbabwe. This, he added, would also be consistent with the South
Africa-proposed UN Security Council Resolution 1809, which was
adopted in April 2008 and which, in Zakane's view, created a "rule"
that the "UN should work cooperatively with the AU."


5. (C) Recalling an earlier demarche presented by Charge, Zakane
expressed disappointment that the United States had not supplemented
its leading role in seeking a UN Security Council resolution on
Zimbabwe with a more active diplomacy in the AU to convince the AU to
take a firmer line on Zimbabwe. Zakane at first even suggested that
the rejection of the U.S.-led resolution (due to a veto by Russia and
China) was in part due to a "lack of coordination with the African
Union."


6. (C) The normally reserved and polite Zakane, perhaps stepping back
from his surprisingly direct criticism of a key ally, the United
States, then added that perhaps the UN resolution was "not such a bad
idea after all." Zakane had felt that the United States had been
taking a risk to propose the resolution because - if it failed - it
might make Mugabe so proud that he would unleash even more violence
against his political opposition. Instead, the UN resolution, even
though not adopted, had been a useful "warning to Mugabe from the
international community."

Brown