Uninvited guest blasts U.S. envoy

A Zimbabwean Foreign Ministry official crashed the U.S. Embassy’s Fourth of July celebrations to criticize the outgoing ambassador.

Samuel Mhango criticized Ambassador Christopher Dell for comments he made about the police assault in March on opposition leaders in Harare, the country’s worsening economic crisis, and what Dell called “the growing climate of desperation and oppression” in Zimbabwe.

“Diplomats are supposed to be bridge builders, not bridge busters,” Mhango said. Dell said afterward that Mhango had not been invited.

Dell, along with independent economic commentators, has predicted that runaway inflation is likely to cause full-scale economic collapse by year’s end. The official inflation rate is 4,500%. U.N. officials estimate one-third of the population will need food aid in the next year.