England 'playing into Mugabe's hands'

Morgan Tsvangirai © Getty Images

If the ECB hoped that the heat would ease now that England's tour of Zimbabwe was finally underway, it was brought back down to earth after Morgan Tsvangirai, the country's opposition leader, said that the trip played right into the hands of Robert Mugabe.

The ECB has been desperate to maintain a divide between cricket and politics, but Tsvangirai, who is in Europe meeting EU officials, said: "The English cricket tour will to all intents and purposes... give credibility to a regime which has been condemned internationally.

"We were appealing or the moral suasion on the part of cricketers to realize that Mugabe means the patron of cricket in Zimbabwe," he continued. "How would they feel, when the Mugabe regime is committing acts of murder, brutality against the people of Zimbabwe, and you are able to shake hands with such a man?" England have said that they will refuse to shake hands with Mugabe in the unlikely event that the situation arises.

And Tsvangirai added that the English cricketers should have realised that they would be used for propaganda purposes.