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Mugabe Murder Plot: Zimbabwe Police Summon Opposition Officials
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| Tsvangirai, denied the charge of plotting to assassinate Mugabe
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HARARE, Feb 26 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Zimbabwe police charged two top opposition party officials Tuesday with treason over an alleged plot to kill longtime leader Robert Mugabe, a party official said.
Percy Makombe, press officer of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), said party secretary general Welshman Ncube and the MDC's shadow minister of lands and agriculture, Renson Gasela, were charged and released after two hours of questioning, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
The police move came a day after opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) was charged with treason in the affair.
Tsvangirai, was yesterday formally charged with treason, which carries a death penalty and was asked to sign a warned and cautioned statement.
He was summoned for questioning at the Criminal Investigation Department at Morris Depot in Harare, the Zimbabwean The Daily News online paper reported.
Briefing journalists after being questioned by the police, looking casual and unperturbed, Tsvangirai said: “I denied the charge completely. I told them this whole thing was contrived to damage me politically and to eliminate me from the presidential race.”
The MDC leader has denied the charge, saying the timing was calculated to keep him out of the March 9-10 presidential race.
The maximum penalty for treason is death.
Ncube and Gasela were named as having attended an initial meeting in Britain last year at which the plan to kill Mugabe was allegedly hatched.
Australia warned Tuesday it could impose sanctions on Zimbabwe while the United States and Britain condemned the action as another sign of Mugabe's autocratic rule ahead of the poll.
The Harare administration has drawn intense international criticism over attempts to ensure Mugabe's re-election, and Canada has said it would lead a push for sanctions against Zimbabwe at a March 2-5 Commonwealth summit.
The U.S. and the European Union have already imposed targeted sanctions against Mugabe and his close associates following a row over E.U. election observers.
"If Mr. Tsvangirai is taken out of the election process altogether, then that will obviously generate a very strong international reaction," said Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer.
Downer described the allegation against Tsvangirai as "without credibility."
Zimbabwe’s state-run daily, The Chronicle, said more people were expected to be interviewed in the ongoing probe into the allegations including "some army officers believed to have been approached for a 'smooth transition' after the assassination of Mugabe."
The charges against Tsvangirai and two of his party's lawmakers stem from a videotape that was first aired February 13 on Australia's Dateline news program.
It showed a former Israeli intelligence agent, Ari Ben Menashe, allegedly discussing a plot to assassinate Mugabe with the MDC leader.
Tsvangirai rejected claims he plotted to kill the president, saying he was set up by government agents.
Menashe was in Zimbabwe on Friday when he gave evidence to the police and publicly castigated Tsvangirai on state television, describing him as "stupid", a "puppet" and a "liar".
The Australian newspaper reported that Menashe has been described in the Israeli press as a "notorious chronic liar."
Tsvangirai on Tuesday is due to meet foreign observers to the presidential polls to describe the conditions under which he has had to prepare for the elections, a party official said.
Foreign observers have been targeted in pre-election violence.
Observers from South Africa, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and the Commonwealth were attacked in separate incidents throughout the country Friday and Sunday.
Downer said: "If we reach a point where the Commonwealth monitors are unable to do their job, we'll withdraw our monitors and will recommend to the Commonwealth it withdraws its monitors and Australia will impose a series of targeted sanctions on Zimbabwe." 
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