PARIS (AFP) — Portugal, current holders of the EU presidency, is doing what it can to ensure that all countries including Zimbabwe take part in December's EU-Africa summit, Prime Minister Jose Socrates said Wednesday.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said that no one in his government will attend the summit in Lisbon if Zimbabwe's president Robert Mugabe is there.
"We are working diplomatically to ensure that no one abandons their place," Socrates told France's L'Express magazine.
"Even those who show justified intransigence on the question of human rights can understand that the summit is necessary precisely to improve human rights," Socrates said.
"EU relations with Zimbabwe remain unchanged: sanctions naturally continue to be applied," he added.
Zimbabwe's information minister Sikhanyiso Ndlovu on Monday called on the EU to remove sanctions, warning that otherwise EU companies operating in Zimbabwe might be told to leave.
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