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THE Zimbabwe government is "committing regime change on itself" with its failing economic policy which has sapped faith in the regime from the population, the US ambassador to Harare said in an interview published Friday.

Speaking to The Guardian via telephone from the Zimbabwean capital, Christopher Dell said that he expected inflation in the poverty-stricken country to reach 1.5 million percent by the end of the year.

"Prices are going up twice a day, in some cases doubling several times a week ... It destabilises everything," Dell told the daily.

He added that he believes "inflation will hit 1.5 million percent by the end of 2007, if not before ... I know that sounds stratospheric but, looking at the way things are going, I believe it is a modest forecast."

"People have completely lost faith in the currency and that means they have lost faith in the government that issues it ... By carrying out disastrous economic policies, the Mugabe government is committing regime change upon itself," Dell said, referring to the country's President Robert Mugabe.

"Things have reached a critical point. I believe the excitement will come in a matter of months, if not weeks. The Mugabe government is reaching end game, it is running out of options."

Dell is expected to leave for a new assignment in Afghanistan next month, and Zimbabwe government officials say he is bitter that he didn't manage to push through his "regime change" agenda.

The country's state media accused Dell of being in the middle of a plot to "destroy the economy, mutilate the Zimbabwe dollar, foment civil unrest and then dangle a US$3 billion 'rescue package' to win the support of gullible politicians."

The state-run Chronicle newspaper reported Thursday that it had obtained a "top-secret document outlining the grand plan".

"The Western governments have -- through the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank -- set up a vast network of regime-change agents, dubbed the Fishmongers Group, that will spearhead acts of economic sabotage against Zimbabwe," the paper reported.

"The revelations explain why US Ambassador Christopher Dell gloated that inflation would hit 1,5 million percent by the end of the year and that President Mugabe would soon be toppled."

The Chronicle said "the plan is to topple the government before the March 2008 general elections, which the West knows the opposition could never win."

The southern African country is in the midst of an economic recession characterised by high inflation, massive unemployment and chronic shortages of foreign currency and basic goods like fuel and the staple cornmeal, largely blamed on Mugabe's government.

Mugabe however blames the woes on targeted sanctions imposed on himself and members of his inner circle by Western powers. - AFP
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