Harare - A United Nations envoy met with some of the tens of thousands of Zimbabweans left homeless in a so-called urban renewal drive that has drawn international condemnation.
Anna Tibaijuka, who arrived last Sunday to assess the humanitarian impact of the government's Operation Murambatsvina, or Drive Out Trash, toured the Caledonia Transit Camp on Friday where about 4 000 people are living in "difficult conditions" outside Harare, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said at the United Nations headquarters in New York.
She also stopped off at demolition sites and places where the government is proposing to relocate people along the road to the eastern city of Mutare, he said.
Police have torched and bulldozed tens of thousands of homes in the campaign to "clean up" shantytowns, markets and other structures they deem illegal.
Humanitarian workers estimate as many as 1,5 million people may have been left homeless in the operation that began on May 19 - many of them forced to destroy their own houses at gunpoint. Several people have also been killed by falling rubble or in accidents involving vehicles used in the operation.
Tibaijuka told CNN on Friday that she was here to talk with those affected and to "assess how we can work together with local authorities, with government to assist them."
The state-run Herald newspaper quoted Tibaijuka on Friday as praising President Robert Mugabe's government for supplying building plots to some of the homeless.
"Allocation of stands for housing is a reflection of the seriousness of government," she was quoted as saying at a meeting with government ministers on Thursday.
But the United Nations said its envoy's comments were reported out of context.
"Her listening to the statements made by the ministers should in no way be seen as her endorsing the government's policy," Dujarric said.
"UN Habitat, the agency that she heads, has clearly stated that forced eviction is one of the main barriers to the significant improvement of slum dwellers."
Stepped up efforts by state media to paint Murambatsvina in a better light coincided with the announcement of Tibaijuka's visit.
Shortly before she arrived, Mugabe launched a reconstruction campaign to accommodate "deserving" people who lost their homes and livelihoods. He promised to build two million homes by 2010, a commitment economists doubt he can afford to keep at a time of economic free-fall.
The Herald did not report if Tibaijuka commented on the evictions, but it quoted her as saying the reconstruction program "is good. The vision is clear."
The main opposition Movement for Democratic Change says the campaign is aimed at breaking up its strongholds among the urban poor and forcing its supporters into rural areas, where Mugabe's Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front party dominates.
The government insists there is no political motive for the campaign, which it says has helped reduce crime and restore order to overcrowded cities.
Tibaijuka told CNN the operation had affected people from all walks of life and from different political parties, but said the majority were poor people who depend on the informal economy to survive.
Human rights groups, churches and most Western countries have condemned the demolitions, which came without warning at the height of the Southern African winter.
The United States renewed its call on Friday for Zimbabwe to stop the demolitions.
"The government of Zimbabwe must respect the rule of law and address the country's serious governance problems if it wants to reverse the sad course that that country is currently on," US state department spokesperson Sean McCormack said in Washington. - Sapa-AP