Shane Ross (Independent)

The matter I wish to raise is the need for the Minister for Foreign Affairs to provide substantial assistance to the people of Zimbabwe during the cholera epidemic. The Minister of State, Deputy Dick Roche, will be aware of this. This is the third time in 18 months I have raised this matter on the Adjournment. That is about the limit beyond which I am not allowed to go. Each time I raised the matter, the circumstances in Zimbabwe had become worse. Each time, I implored the Government to take some sort of direct and particularly powerful unilateral action to help to resolve the critical problem in Zimbabwe.

Many international surveys have found the Government has played an honourable role in this area. Be it openly or behind the scenes, we have done as much as we can as a small neutral country but, in the present circumstances, we could possibly do more. The Minister of State will be aware that circumstances in Zimbabwe have become even worse because of a cholera epidemic. The problem is exacerbated by the political and physical circumstances in the country. When a nation with a collapsed infrastructure is struck by disease, famine or any such disaster, it is almost impossible to resolve the problem or prevent the disease from spreading. Zimbabwe is quite noticeably not equipped to fight an epidemic of this sort. Cholera is a horrible disease.

Fortunately, in some cases cholera can be pretty easily remedied and cured. The tragedy of what is occurring in Zimbabwe is that the people are suffering from a disease that is attacking them very rapidly and which could be cured if the nation had the appropriate equipment and minerals. Medically one can sort out cholera pretty easily with water, salt and sugar, but the population literally does not have these products. I ask the Minister of State to use his good offices to ensure that the international community, particularly the European Union, of which he is so strong an advocate, will prove its worth by delivering the necessary materials to Zimbabwe. There is a case for delivering them against the wishes of the regime in the country, if necessary. The United States and United Kingdom both stated at the weekend that it has probably come to the point where we should force the Zimbabwean authorities to accept external aid and not hinder its delivery. Ireland could play a significant role in this regard.

Some 12,000 cases of cholera have been already reported and 500 are dead. The rate of death is increasing much more rapidly than is normal in a cholera epidemic because there is no equipment to prevent the spread of the disease. In addition, people are in such awful circumstances that they are eating cows that have been infected by anthrax. What the country needs is clean water, achievable through chlorination, and waste disposal mechanisms. The disease must be prevented from spreading to South Africa, Botswana, Zambia and Mozambique.

I do not know if the Minister of State knows that the political circumstances are worsening by the day in Zimbabwe. That the negotiations with the Opposition are over or are in deadlock means Mr. Mugabe still holds unfettered power. A very nasty incident took place on 3 December in which a group of 12 men, supposedly members of the Zimbabwean police force took away Ms Jestina Mukoko from her home. Nobody knows whether it was an abduction or an arrest. The men were armed and claimed to be policemen. There is much doubt about this because they left the scene in a car without number plates and Ms Mukoko has not been seen since. She is the president of the Zimbabwe Peace Project, a project that monitors human rights in Zimbabwe. Her disappearance has caused great anxiety among members of Amnesty International, who are on the ground in the country monitoring a series of similar events that occurred recently. Ms Mukoko is certainly entitled to lawyers and access to the outside world. She is entitled to be told where she is being held. She is not the only such person in that trades unionists and others, in a country that is falling apart, have been arrested and taken away without anybody knowing what has happened to them.

I would like the Minister of State, if he can, to spell out whether the situation for him and this Government has changed sufficiently to ensure — not just because of the political tyranny that exists there, nor the total collapse of the economy where inflation is so severe that prices double every three days or because of the awful natural disasters which are attacking the country — that action is taken by the international community to see that the people of Zimbabwe are no longer subjected to this tyranny and that humanitarian aid is brought to them immediately.