External Link : NZ government may ban Zimbabwe

[Tintin]

New Zealand may ban a planned tour by the Zimbabwe cricket team scheduled for December because of "appalling abuses of human rights" perpetrated by Robert Mugabe's government, Phil Goff, the country's foreign minister, has stated.

"The Zimbabwe cricket team should not anticipate that it will be granted entry into New Zealand," Goff said in a statement. "The imposition of a ban on the team would send a strong message to the Mugabe regime that New Zealanders and their government abhor the actions it is taking against its people."

http://content.cricinfo.com/newzeala...ry/211715.html

[Akib]

Seems like few countries want to play Zimbabwe. You have to feel sorry for their players. Politics is denying them the chance to play.

[Ahmed_B]

I was watching the ESPN sports news and they just reported that Zimbabwe hav been denied their ICC scheduled Away tour to the NewZealand later this year by the NZ government on political ground. The NZ government claims that this is their protest against the Autocratic Mugabe govt. and the ZIM team is not welcome in NZ!!

This is another very ugly example of affecting sports for politics or is it just an excuse by the NZ govt. to humilliate ZIM cricket?!

Sigh!

Here's the related news link in ICC website!

Edited on, June 24, 2005, 6:10 PM GMT, by crickethorizon.

[mahbubH]

Cricinfo staff

June 26, 2005

It is expected that the New Zealand government will ask Australia and Great Britain to support a call for the ICC to ban Zimbabwe from international cricket because of the Robert Mugabe regime's rapidly deteriorating human-rights record.

On Monday, the New Zealand cabinet meets, and one of the items high on the agenda will be whether to refuse to grant visas to the Zimbabwe team for their scheduled visit in December. Although New Zealand are due to travel to Zimbabwe in August, the government has ruled out a ban as it is not able to prevent its citizens from travelling abroad. But an entry ban would have the desired effect as well as enabling New Zealand Cricket to avoid any penalty from the ICC.

Phil Goff, the foreign minister, who has been outspoken on the issue, said that he will ask Jack Straw, the British foreign secretary, and Alexander Downer, his Australian counterpart, to back his call to have Zimbabwe banned altogether. He is also believed to be discussing the situation with Martin Snedden, the New Zealand board's chief executive, who is in London for the annual ICC get together.

"Most of us don't want to see sport being used as a political weapon," Goff told the Sunday Star-Times. "But in some cases you just can't ignore sporting teams going to countries where this sort of thing is happening and pretend nothing is wrong. It is time the ICC showed some leadership on this issue.

"We need to make an approach to the ICC, saying surely there must be circumstances in which your affiliate members can be excused from their contractual obligations. No human being can ignore the atrocities that are going on in Zimbabwe today."

What began as a little local difficulty is again threatening to escalate into something more serious, and the subject of Zimbabwe is once again becoming a hot potato for the game's administrators.

The ICC is unlikely to shift from its well-worn policy that it can only become involved in the security of teams and officials and not the internal politicals of any country. But if the crisis in Zimbabwe becomes an international affair - and Africa is a hot topic at the moment - then that could mean the heat on cricket's administrators is racked up more than ever.

Adam Parore, the former New Zealand wicketkeeper, gave a possible taste of things to come when he told reporters that the tour was "a disaster waiting to happen," adding that the ICC was to blame for implementing a future tour programme "knowing damn well that half the countries involved in it are unsafe, involved in terrorism, harbouring terrorism, or have civil wars going on."

© Cricinfo

[mahbubH]

Thanks.

[reinausagi]

Here are some points to ponder:

The Kiwis are consulting the aussies and the poms on this isuue. What precludes th othe full ICC members from rendering intelligent comment on the Zimbabwe question: the fact that they are not as fair-skinned as the aforemention three, that they reside on the wrong side of the economic tracks, or is it that by and large they are in the camp described by Adam Parore as "countries involved in it are unsafe, involved in terrorism, harbouring terrorism, or have civil wars going on."

If the Kiwis honestly believe that threatening to yank the test status of Bobby's cricketers is going to be a deterrent, they are a tad naive. This call for a mass enrollment of the New Zealand foriegn office in the Kennedy school of Government. While the foreign policy of the US may have been highjacked the Rhumsfeld and the defence establishment in recent years, the east coast school still teaches the best diplomacy in the world.

Let's concede, for the sake of argument that Mugabe does care about being able to play test cricket in Christchurch. Do the Kiwis think that banning them and therefore withdrawing the ICC's meddling eyes from Mugabe's affairs would slow down, or, accelerate his own brand of social change in Zimbabwe?

[Tintin]

[/quote] Let's concede, for the sake of argument that Mugabe does care about being able to play test cricket in Christchurch. Do the Kiwis think that banning them and therefore withdrawing the ICC's meddling eyes from Mugabe's affairs would slow down, or, accelerate his own brand of social change in Zimbabwe? [/quote]


While i have no idea about the status of things, may I suggest that cricket could just be a part of a bigger plan of cutting of all relations - sporting, economic and others - with Zimbabwe.

[crickwizard]

Can someone shade lights on what are the ongoing human right violation in Zim? The things i heard of that lands from whites are taken and given to local ZIM citizens and it is the only country in the world where whites are discriminated at some level due to their past domination. And then anyone against Mugabe gets tortured and goes to jail, what the other violations?

[reverse_swing]

Well all the test playing countries are bound to play each other. They've all agreed to it. New Zealand Cricket board will face a fine of up to $US2 million under ICC regulations if it pulls out . Also touring country will also liable for all financial losses suffered by the hosts.

[thebest]

Do you know the last sporting represenative of a country visited aparthied South Africa. It is Rugby team of New Zealand. This resulted boycot of Olympics in Montreal 1976. So it is ok for visitng white South Africa even if human right abuse but not black Zimbabue. What a hypocracy
New Zealand

[Hatebreed]

I doubt an animal like Mugabe will give a toss about NZ banning ZW to play there.

Why doesnt the US go and take down Mugabe like they did Saddam?.. Remember, US's main claim was 'Iraq has and will use WMD!'..so where the F**K is it? They got saddam, which is good. If US is concerned at all about other people's human rights they should get the f**k out of Iraq and eradicate Mugabe's regime.

[tiger_man]

ehsan mani made a good comment....mugabe wouldnt give a **** about zimbabwe loosing status in cricket, he has other stuff at stake....

if he was at all concerned about zimbabwe's cricketing future, like we are about our cricket team, then he wouldnt have got rid of all those worldclass players from his team....just coz they are white...

sporting ban would do nothing.....they need to take more stingent measures, such as banning petrolium import into the country.....that should teach him a lesson...put an embargo or sth....

[tiger_man]

however banning zimbabwe does make sense to some extent....

south africa got banned for racism against black....now zimbabwe is doing the same thing in reverse, so to be fair, they should take the same actions...

bangladesh will however suffer, coz now they have a team they can beat with some ease..... and they are gettning banned

[shaoun]

if a country picks players by their skin color that country doesnt deserve to play. zimbabwe should be out of test cricket until this problem is fixed. icc should take action. i am tired of seeing icc just standing back on some serious issues. the zimbabwe issue is very serious and some action should be taken by icc and the action should be ban them from international cricket until this racism problem in their cricket team is fixed.