GENEVA — The United Nations chief rejected Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe’s claims that a cholera epidemic was under control and said Friday that responsibility lay with the country’s leaders.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said he was “deeply disturbed at the deteriorating humanitarian situation there, for which the leadership of Zimbabwe cannot evade responsibility.”
Mugabe had said the outbreak in his country was contained with the help of aid agencies. Ban said that he had been closely following the situation and “cannot agree” with Mugabe’s assessment.
“The reports I have been receiving . . . are alarming,” Ban told reporters. “There are still many people who are suffering from this epidemic.”
The World Health Organization said the cholera death toll in Zimbabwe had risen to 792 people and that the number of cholera cases that have been reported since the outbreak began in August was now 16,700.
WHO spokeswoman Fadela Chaib said, “I don’t think that the cholera outbreak is under control.” The epidemic has reached a fatality rate of 4.7 percent. To be under control, it would have to be less than 1 percent, she said. The Associated Press
