Harare - Former Israeli intelligence agent Ari Ben-Menashe has claimed that
the United States Central Intelligence Agency was going to help Zimbabwe's
opposition Movement for Democratic Change assassinate President Robert Mugabe.
Ben-Menashe made the claim in the Harare High Court on Wednesday, the third
day of the treason trial of MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai and two of his
senior lieutenants.
Ben-Menashe, the state's star witness, testified that Tsvangirai and his
men asked his Canadian political consultancy, Dickens and Madson, for
advice about a plan to assassinate Mugabe and topple his government in a coup.
The state's case is resting on an almost inaudible videotape secretly
recorded by Ben-Menashe. It is purported to reveal Tsvangirai discussing
the assassination plan at a meeting in the boardroom of Dickens and Madson
in Montreal on December 4, 2001.
Ben-Menashe said one of the men sitting in the room at that meeting had
"introduced himself as Simms" and said that he worked for "Team America".
Asked by deputy attorney-general Bharat Patel what "Team America" was, Ben
Menashe said, "In the lingo, that's the CIA."
His company had brought Simms in to assist with Mugabe's "elimination".
Tsvangirai's counsel, human rights lawyer George Bizos, has asked Justice
Paddington Garwe to rule the tape inadmissible as evidence because it is
inaudible.
Judge Garwe rejected the plea. The hearing continues on Thursday. -
Independent Foreign Service
http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=84&art_id=vn20030206053349109C859500&set_id=1
