President Robert Mugabe has said he has no assets in foreign countries and told the British and the European Union to seize any if they find them, according to a report by Zimbabwe's state-owned The Herald newspaper Tuesday.
This report came after British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Monday that he had asked the British Finance Ministry to hunt down the assets of senior Zimbabwean officials and pledged to ramp up the illegal sanctions.
The report quoted analysts as saying that Britain's move is aimed to help Zimbabwean opposition MDC-T leader Morgan Tsvangirai, who won a leading number of votes in Zimbabwe's first round of presidential election but boycotted the run-off, citing violence against his supporters as the major reason.
The UN Security Council failed last week to reach an agreement to impose sanctions against Zimbabwe.
Russia and China vetoed a U.S.-drafted resolution in the UN Security Council on Friday that would impose sanctions on Zimbabwe over the country's presidential run-off election in late June.
The failed text calls for a travel ban and an assets freeze on President Robert Mugabe and his top officials, as well as an arms embargo.
Washington has been threatening to act unilaterally against Mugabe and his government following his re-election in the vote denounced by Zimbabwean opposition parties, the United State and some Western countries as unfair.
"We don't believe that the Mugabe regime is a legitimate government ... because they ran a sham election," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said last month.
Source:Xinhua
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