ADDING TO THE TARGETED SANCTIONS LIST
20 April, 2007


The European Union has added five new names of deputy ministers to the list of people banned from travelling to and doing business in Europe. The new Zanu PF officials on the list are:

Walter Mzembi, Water Resources and Infrastructural Development deputy minister.
Tracey Mutinhiri, deputy minister of Indigenisation and Empowerment.
Titus Maluluke, deputy Minister of Education Sport and Culture.
Lazarus Dokora, deputy Minister of Higher and Tertiary Education.
Aguy Georgias, deputy Minister of Economic Development.

The five names were added by ambassadors of the EU member states meeting in Brussels, as Zimbabwe celebrated Independence Day.

The ambassadors released a statement expressing "strong concern at the rapidly deteriorating human rights, political and economic situation in Zimbabwe".

The five deputy ministers join 124 top Zimbabwean officials, including Robert Mugabe, who are forbidden to enter the EU. The targeted smart sanctions also entail the freezing of assets of those on the list in the 27-nation bloc.

Last month the EU added Masvingo politician, Dzikamai Mavhaire’s name to the growing sanctions list after he was re-admitted to the ruling Zanu PF. Mavhaire once called on Mugabe to go and was suspended from the ruling party, but was reinstated last year. He was elevated to the party’s supreme decision-making body, the politburo, to replace the late Josiah Tungamirai.