"Our tenure at the head of the [United Nations' Security Council] is characterised by an indifference to human rights and temporising with tyranny. We have now all but lost much of the moral high ground we once had under President Mandela.  Our window of opportunity is fast closing, as Britain will next month assume the chairpersonship. If they put Zimbabwe on the agenda when we opposed such a move, our moral high ground will be lost completely," says Tony Leon, head of the Democratic Alliance, South Africa's official opposition, speaking of Dumisani Khumalo's decision to reject a British request to discuss Zimbabwe.

As a follow-up to their recent support for the brutal kleptocracy in Myanmar, it is a strident and jarring reminder that respect for democracy in South Africa is not yet certain.

The general indifference within South Africa to this type of behaviour is also cause for concern.  All people are represented by the governments that they deserve; South Africa no less than Zimbabwe.

While the rest of the world can only with great difficulty intervene (lest they wind up mired in the incontinence that is Iraq) it is essential that loud protest be heard from all responsible believers in freedom and representative democracies.