Delegations from 162 countries gathering in Rome to seek ways out of a global food crisis, will be addressed Tuesday by President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, according to local media reports.
Mugabe is in the Italian capital for an important UN world food conference being held in response to soaring prices and the growing demand for food.
Despite facing a presidential run-off against opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai later this month, he is taking several days out in Rome with his wife and a small coterie of officials.
The European Union has a longstanding travel ban on the veteran leader but he is allowed to attend UN summits. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) that is hosting the summit said all member countries were invited and that it is at the discretion of each member state who they decide to send.
According to BBC, FAO director general Jacque Diouf refused to be drawn on whether Mugabe's presence here might be unhelpful. As an invited guest and the head of the Zimbabwe delegation, Mugabe will get the chance later this week to address the summit.
Each leader is offered an opportunity to speak for five to 10minutes. In 2005 at a similar conference, Mugabe used that opportunity to launch a stinging attack on American President George W. Bush and then British Prime Minister Tony Blair, calling them "international terrorists" and comparing them to Adolf Hitler.
He told the major donors not to "foist" their food on his people. On that occasion he received a round of applause from some African delegations.
Mugabe is not the only controversial world leader at this summit. Also attending is the Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who will be making his first trip to Western Europe as Iran's president, and Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez.
Mugabe arrived in Rome on Sunday night to attend the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization conference. Some European Union leaders immediately tried to protest the president's presence in the Italian capital, but FAO stood its ground, saying the conference had nothing to do with EU sanctions on Zimbabwe.
Source:Xinhua
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