The Official Goodbye

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On 11 December, Zimbabwe's foreign minister, Stanley G. Mudenge (photo below), officially wrote to the Commonwealth secretary general, Don McKinnon, terminating Zimbabwe's membership of the Commonwealth. For the record, we publish the letter in full.

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"I am writing to convey to you the decision of the government of the Republic of Zimbabwe to terminate its membership of the Commonwealth as of 7 December 2003. Once again, for the record, Zimbabwe reiterates its principled position as stated in my statement of 20 March 2002 following the Troika's Marlborough House decision of 19 March 2002, and later extensively developed in the Zimbabwe government document of November 2002 entitled, The Commonwealth and …