Arafat meets Mugabe

Palestinain leader Yasser Arafat left South Africa on Thursday night for Zimbabwe, where he held talks on Friday with President Robert Mugabe, agencies reported. “I was speaking with President Mugabe how much we have suffered as Israel destroys our cities, homes and villages,” Arafat was quoted as saying by Zimbabwe’s state-owned Ziana news agency. South African Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma told a news conference on Friday that the situation in the Middle East was grave and that a resumption of peace talks was necessary to avoid further suffering. “We must get Israel and Palestine back to the negotiating table,” she said. While in south Africa Arafat attended a special meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Zimbabwe is a member of the NAM committee on Palestine. The NAM meeting came as Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres on Thursday urged US President George W. Bush to play an active role in helping to end the conflict. At least 402 Palestinians have been killed in seven months of clashes, along with 13 Israeli Arabs and 76 Israelis. Arafat on Thursday urged the NAM to back his call for an unarmed international observer force in the West Bank and Gaza.