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Johannesburg: Zimbabwe's bitter factions are close to a power-sharing agreement in talks mediated by South Africa, an aide to mediator South African President Thabo Mbeki said on Saturday.
Mbeki, speaking yesterday at the opening of a regional summit, had spent much of the past week in Zimbabwe trying to push Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and his rival Morgan Tsvangirai to strike a deal.
Chances that Mbeki would be able to present an agreement at the summit appeared slim after Tsvangirai walked out of talks in Harare on Tuesday but an opposition official said yesterday that the negotiations were back on track.
"We're talking here," Tendai Biti, Tsvangirai's top negotiator, said after attending the opening session of the summit of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
Heads of state
Biti sat with Tsvangirai just behind Cabinet ministers from the region during the opening session, while Mugabe sat at the front table with other heads of state. Tsvangirai and Mugabe both claim the mandate to lead Zimbabwe, stalling power-sharing talks over the issue of who should have the main role in any unity government.
Sydney Mufamadi, a South African Cabinet minister closely involved in the talks, was optimistic.
"We're close," Mufamadi said. "We're now relying on the collective wisdom of this leadership." The regional summit was drawing the world's attention.
In a statement, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the meeting offered Africans an important opportunity to support the negotiations, adding that "the outside world continues to watch developments in Zimbabwe closely and with concern, not least given the deteriorating humanitarian situation. We will do all we can to help."
On the eve of the summit, German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul called on Zimbabwe's neighbours "finally to make fully clear to Robert Mugabe that a new government in Zimbabwe that must reflect the will of the Zimbabwean population is necessary."
The South Africans, appointed mediators by SADC, helped guide Mugabe and Tsvangirai to sign a memorandum of understanding July 21 establishing a framework for negotiations. In his summit speech Saturday, Mbeki praised that agreement.
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