Man wounds eight in knife attack
The World Health Organization (WHO) should overturn its decision to appoint Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe as a goodwill ambassador, global health leaders said on Saturday, describing the move as unjustifiable and wrong.
Britain said Mugabe’s appointment was “surprising and disappointing” and added that it risked overshadowing the WHO’s global work. The United States, which has imposed sanctions on Mugabe for alleged human rights violations, said it was “disappointed.” “This appointment clearly contradicts the United Nations’ ideals of respect for human rights and human dignity,” a US State Department spokesperson said.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced the appointment at a high-level meeting on noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) in Uruguay on Wednesday.
The meeting was attended by Mugabe, 93. He is blamed in the West for destroying his country’s economy and numerous human rights abuses during his 37 years leading the country as either president or prime minister. In a speech, Tedros praised Zimbabwe as “a country that places universal health coverage and health promotion at the center of its policies to provide health care to all”.
The NCD Alliance, which represents 28 international health groups seeking to combat chronic diseases, said it was “shocked and deeply concerned” to hear of the appointment, given Mugabe’s “long track record of human rights violations”.
WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier said the WHO chief had made the move seeking broad support for the agency’s work. “Tedros has frequently talked of his determination to build a global movement to promote high-level political leadership for health,” he said by e-mail.
Human rights activists also criticised the move. Hillel Neuer, executive director of the Geneva-based group UN Watch described the choice by WHO, a United Nations agency as “sickening”. BERLIN: A man injured eight people with a knife in the German city of Munich on Saturday and police has detained a suspect. His victims include a 12-year-old boy and a woman. Munich police chief Hubertus Andrae told a news conference that eight people have been lightly injured in the attack and that the suspect was known to police from previous offences, including burglary. “We have no indication of a terrorist, political, or religious motive,” Andrae said. “I assume it is to do with a psychological disorder of the perpetrator.” Police had earlier said they believe the man, who attacked people at several different locations, acted alone. The Spanish government decided on Saturday to sack the secessionist leadership of Catalonia and force the region into a new election, saying it had to take the unprecedented step to prevent the region pushing ahead with independence. The plan, which still requires the approval of the upper house Senate, seeks to resolve Spain’s worst political crisis in four decades but risks an angry reaction from independence supporters, who plan street protests later in the day. In outlining the cabinet’s decision, Prime Minister