Sidi,
It is interesting you raised the issue of Cook's 'Ethical Foreign Policy.'
Believe me this is the butt of media jokes here in Britain, especially in the
Tabloids like the Sun. This is the gov't that is busy sending military
hardware to Indonesia which in turn is used on innocent civilians in East
Timor and Indonesia whilst on the other hand lecturing on Ethics in Foreign
Policy. I don't think that foreign policy can be ethical in the present world
order; simply because modern external relations is premised on trade and
selfish national interests. It might have ethical dimensions but Foreign
Policy doesn't lose sleep over the dilemma of job losses at home as opposed
to civilian casualties in a foreign country where a war is being waged and it
has to approve applications for military weapons.  To their credit, they have
turned down Zimbabwe's application to purchase some military hardware
sometime this month. I wouldn't place that on Cook's 'Ethical Foreign Policy'
rather on Blair's disgust of Mugabe. Remember Mugabe engaged in an all out
tirade against gays in Blair's cabinet [some three of them] during the
Commonwealth Heads of Gov't Meeting earlier this year. Blair is said to be
still very furious with him.
Coming back to the serious issue of land resettlement. I concur with you that
part of the solution lies in Britain. I'm just very sceptical on Blair
delivering anything substantial so long as there is no new strong forthright
leadership in Zimbabwe that pursues this vigorously and in the correct
avenues rather exploit it's sentiments to score political capital as Mugabe
clearly was doing. Maybe it's just the pessimism of my intellect working
here, but we are no where nearer a credible effort in this perversion of
justice by the British gov't.
Once again thanks for sharing your insights with me.
Hamjatta Kanteh

hkanteh

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