Straw calls for action on Mugabe

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw stepped up the pressure on Robert Mugabe today when he called for a "short, fixed timetable" for reforms after increasing violence in the run-up to the Zimbabwean presidential elections.

However, as EU foreign ministers met this morning to discuss what action could be taken against the president, it looked unlikely that they would bring in immediate sanctions.

Several countries are worried that if they did so, the president would retract his offer to allow international monitors to oversee the polling in the elections in six weeks. Mr Mugabe has agreed to international monitors except British ones.

Mr Straw wants to propose freezing the president's assets in Europe this week and would like the EU to ban him and his ministers from travelling here. The Foreign Secretary may also call for the suspension of Zimbabwe from the Commonwealth.