(22 Jul 2005)
1. Wide exterior of United Nations
2. Wide interior conference room with podium
3. Cutaway reporters
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Anna Tibaijuka, UN envoy to Zimbabwe
"About 2.4 million people have been affected by this operation. That is about 18 percent of the population of Zimbabwe. So we are talking about great difficulties in one way or another, particularly households affected by loosing incomes. Family households not able to sell their vegetables, for example, if the people who use to procure from produce are no longer able to operate."
5. Cutaway reporters
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Anna Tibaijuka, UN Envoy to Zimbabwe
"With 700,000 people badly affected, needing assistance in terms of immediate needs, food, water, sanitation services, above all shelter; a good number of people are simply sleeping out in the open that we didn't need have to come up. The first thing we really need from the government of Zimbabwe as stated by the Secretary General, is to cease the demolitions which were continuing as I was leaving the country."
7. Cutaway reporters
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Anna Tibaijuka, UN Envoy to Zimbabwe:
"I was not really looking into apportion blame, but try and understand as I have done in an elaborate report in order to be able to solve the problems in the future. Of course you have to understand where I was coming from. It looks to have come from simple misconceptions that you could reverse urbanisation."
9. Cutaway reporter
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Anna Tibaijuka, UN Envoy to Zimbabwe:
"As I have said in terms of collective responsibility, of course the government of Zimbabwe is collectively responsible for what has happened but in the absence of a coherent, well thought-out plan, it was also clear that a group of people, definitely advising to the high officers were behind this operation."
11. Wide pan conference room
12. Wide of report
13. Close up report
STORYLINE:
Zimbabwe's destruction of urban slums is a "disastrous venture" that has left 700,000 people without homes or jobs,
violated international law and created a grave humanitarian crisis, a harshly worded U.N. report said Friday.
The report detailed the devastating extent of Operation Murambatsvina, or Drive Out Trash, for the first time.
It said a further 2.4 million people have been affected by the countrywide campaign that began with little warning on May 19 and has seen thousands of shantytowns, ramshackle markets and makeshift homes demolished.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said the report was "profoundly distressing."
The report, using unusually harsh language for the United Nations, said the operation clearly violated international law, and it demanded that the government immediately stop the destruction.
Anna Tibaijuka, a U.N. envoy sent to Zimbabwe to study the effects of the campaign, delivered the document to Secretary-General Kofi Annan earlier this week.
She suggested an independent probe could help decide if there was criminal negligence leading to any deaths.
Yet in a news conference later, she refused to single out Zimbabwe's dictatorial president, Robert Mugabe.
Annan urged Zimbabwe to stop the destruction and also sought to shift the attention from blame to rebuilding.
The Zimbabwe government was given the final report Wednesday but has not commented on it publicly.
The opposition in Zimbabwe and human rights activists welcomed the report.
President Robert Mugabe's government has defended the operation as an urban cleanup drive and has promised to help the displaced rebuild.
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