South Africa - six years after freedom from minority rule - is a daily miracle of democratic practise and economic progress.

But we live in a rough neighbourhood. Respect for democracy, human rights and the rule of law is uneven in Sub-Saharan Africa, and today is observed only in the breach in Zimbabwe.

South Africa and Zimbabwe are geographically and politically separate. World investors - and the European Union (EU) - need to remember this. Even though the South African government is not perfect, it is still procedurally democratic and substantially unlike the Mugabe regime.

But Zimbabwe's crisis cannot be ring-fenced. The violation of political rights and property rights by the ruling party there - and the inadequate response by Southern African leaders - threatens the significant economic gains which have been made by Mozambique, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa. For example:

What democratic South Africa, regional leaders and the world should not countenance, is for a lawless Zimbabwe to transform our hopes for an African Renaissance into an African nightmare.

More than one view out of South Africa:

The Financial Times of London has written that South Africa's stance on Zimbabwe is doing the region "more harm than good". This may be so. But let me remind the European Parliament that in South Africa there is more than one view on Zimbabwe. The relative freedom and strength of opposition parties in South Africa is one of the distinctions which positively differentiates us from our neighbour across the Limpopo.

Normally, it would be extraordinarily disrespectful for me to go abroad and speak in the European Parliament, and disparage and criticise South African foreign policy regarding Zimbabwe or anywhere else. This would undermine the diplomatic convention which expects a bipartisan approach, on such issues, especially before a foreign audience. However, even as Leader of the Opposition, not I nor anyone else outside President Mbeki's magic circle, has the slightest idea about our foreign policy towards Zimbabwe.

We are literally in the dark. This inexplicable situation happens because President Thabo Mbeki doesn't trust his own Department of Foreign Affairs. And he never, ever, not a single time, trusts the broad mass of the people of South Africa - or lets them into his confidence. So our posture towards Zimbabwe has to be gleaned from events, gestures and symbols.

What should be South Africa's response to the tragedy unfolding and the crisis unravelling in Zimbabwe? South Africa's position should be analogous with someone who sees his neighbour's house on fire.

Generally, you have two options; you can try to insulate yourself: pass by on the other side of the road and ignore the Biblical injunction to be a Good Samaritan. Or you can cross the boundary wall and help to extinguish the fire.

President Robert Mugabe - the very man who bears primary responsibility for the political violence and uncertainty in Zimbabwe - is now being cosseted and comforted by his neighbours.

At Victoria Falls, Presidents Mbeki, Chissano and Nujoma rallied around President Mugabe and made as if frustrations at the pace of land reform in Zimbabwe was the only issue. But clearly after 20 years in Government, the ruling party ZANU-PF is using land invasions as vehicles for political intimidation. Land is the smokescreen. Avoiding democracy and suppressing opposition is the reality.

Mugabe's record of shame:

The Zimbabwe government is in violation of practically every single one of its international obligations and regional protocols - be they from the United Nations, the Lome Convention of African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) nations, the Commonwealth, the Organisation of African Unity, the South African Development Community, the G77 or the Non-Aligned Movement. It has violated rights to life, liberty and property. For example:

In short, President Mugabe has behaved like an outlaw: his Government must be treated as an international outcast.

International commitments:

My call on the international community - and especially the European Union - is to be the Good Samaritan. Do not pass Southern Africa by on the other side of the road.

The Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action adopted at the UN World Conference on Human Rights in 1993 is the most current statement by the world community of its commitment to the promotion and protection of universal human rights. Every member state of the United Nations was represented, including Zimbabwe. The Convention solemnly adopted the following articles:-

White farmers are clearly a scapegoat minority in Zimbabwe. They will lose their property and livelihood to land seizure without compensation from the State. Over a thousand have already lost these rights to the illegal land invasions. Two farmers have lost their lives to this campaign, while many farmers and farmworkers have been attacked and beaten by the ZANU-PF supporters. But it is the political intimidation of (mostly black) opposition supporters which signals the wider denial of democratic rights and freedom in Zimbabwe.

EU commitments:

Let me remind the EU of Europe's strong commitment to upholding democracy, human rights and the rule of law. On the eve of the 1993 UN World Conference on Human Rights, Catherine Lalumiere said the following on behalf of the Council of Europe:

Such an excellent discription of human rights and international obligations needs to be acted upon with vigour. There can be no doubt that the current government of Zimbabwe is a "gravedigger of human rights".

The post-Lome new framework agreement between the EU and 71 African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) countries includes certain significant provisions which have direct application to the current crisis in Harare. At the third ministerial post-Lome conference, the ACP and EU countries agreed that "good governance" will be a fundamental feature of the new convention and that "cases of gross corruption" will trigger suspensions of aid. Flagrant violations of human rights, democratic principles and the rule of law also specifically trigger certain measures and mechanisms.

Although the new convention will be ratified only in June 2000, the text gives clear direction of where the EU and responsible ACP nations are moving. Zimbabwe has clearly now moved outside the boundaries of good governance by counternancing both gross violations of its citizens' civil and human rights and the rule of law, and by state-sponsered acts of corruption, especially in regard to land reform.

The struggle for human rights, justice and democracy in Zimbabwe today is in many ways analogous to the struggle in South Africa twenty years ago. The international community should treat the situation in the same way. It should not allow Zimbabwe to sink or Southern Africa to disappear into a wasteland of conflict, famine, disease and dictatorship - all the worst nightmares of Afro-pessimism.

Many of the actions taken by the United Nations against South Africa's National Party Government could be applied to Zimbabwe today. For example:

It is worth recording that before peace and democracy came to South Africa those currently in government in South Africa were the most strident and insistent with their calls for intervention and international interaction in South Africa. It is time for all of us - in Southern Africa, Europe and the world - to make a concerted effort to apply our best principles and promises to the people of Zimbabwe.