Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has accepted a broad UN offer of food aid but is still opposed to an emergency shelter scheme for victims of a government urban slum demolition campaign, the United Nations said Tuesday.
Jan Egeland, the UN humanitarian affairs and emergency relief co-ordinator, met Mugabe on Tuesday over the world body's criticism of a controversial urban "clean-up" drive that left thousands of people homeless earlier this year.
The two met in Harare a day after Egeland toured several settlements where families have been huddling in makeshift plastic tents after their houses were destroyed in a campaign the government held up as a vast reconstruction programme.
Egeland emerged after more than an hour of talks to tell reporters differences remained on the key question of housing, but agreement had been reached on funding for AIDS and food.
"There is agreement to work, to re-double our efforts to be much more effective to meet all the challenges of millions of people infected with HIV ... (and) several million people being food insecure (facing shortages)," Egeland said.
Egeland said the talks with the combative Zimbabwean leader were very "frank" and had focused on how the UN and international donors could help meet vast humanitarian needs for a country in a deep economic crisis.
"There are issues we disagree on frankly, but we also agree on the importance of the international community to raise its profile in pursuing humanitarian principles," Egeland said.
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