The World Health Organization on Saturday cited Zimbabwe’s anti-tobacco record and efforts against non-communicable diseases as justifications for making President Robert Mugabe a “goodwill ambassador”, as International criticism of the move mounted. The UN health agency, led since July by former Ethiopian health minister Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has asked Mugabe to serve in the role to help tackle NCDs like heart attacks, strokes and asthma across Africa. The appointment announced earlier this week in Uruguay has triggered confusion and anger by activists who note that Zimbabwe’s healthcare system, like many of its public services, has collapsed under Mugabe’s authoritarian regime. Britain on Saturday joined the widening chorus of critics, calling the decision “surprising and disappointing, particularly in light of the current US and EU sanctions against him.” “We have registered our concerns with WHO Director General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus”, a foreign office spokesperson said in an email. Mugabe’s “appointment risks overshadowing the work undertaken globally by the WHO on Non-Communicable Diseases.” Zimbabwean activist and human rights lawyer Doug Coltart said on Twitter that a “man who flies to Singapore for treatment because he has destroyed Zimbabwe’s health sector is WHO’s goodwill ambassador.” Mugabe, who is 93 and has been in power since 1980, is in increasingly fragile health and makes regular trips abroad for medical treatment. UN Watch, a group primarily known for defending Israel at the world body, called the decision “sickening.” “Amid reports of ongoing human rights abuses, the tyrant of Zimbabwe is the last person who should be legitimized by a UN position of any kind,”, the group’s executive director Hillel Neuer said in a statement. Published in Daily Times, October 22nd 2017.