“We will press for strong action by the United Nations, including an arms embargo on Zimbabwe and travel ban on regime officials,” Mr. Bush said in a statement issued while he spent the weekend at Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland.

The European Union said it would not rule out taking sanctions against “those responsible for the tragic events of recent months,” according to an EU presidency statement.

The June 27 runoff election was widely condemned by African and other world leaders. Mr. Mugabe, who was inaugurated June 29, was the only candidate and western observers said the few Zimbabweans who went to the polls did so only out of fear.

According to human rights groups, at least 86 people died and some 200,000 were forced from their homes. Most of the violence was blamed on police, soldiers and Mugabe militants. There were reports of victims being beaten for hours and bodies mutilated. When the main targets could not be found, relatives —elderly parents, young siblings—were attacked.

The U.S. already has financial and travel penalties in place against more than 170 citizens and entities with ties to Mr. Mugabe, White House spokesman Emily Lawrimore said. The Bush administration is considering punishing the government of Zimbabwe as well as further restricting the travel and financial activities of Mugabe supporters, she said.

When Mr. Mugabe attended the June 30 African Union summit in Egypt, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga urged the African Union to suspend President Mugabe.

But the west didn’t get the full condemnation that it wanted. “President Omar Bongo of Gabon, who has held power for 41 years and won a series of widely criticised elections, gave his public backing for Mr. Mugabe as leaders met in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh,” the London-based Telegraph reported June 30.

“He was elected, he took an oath, and he is here with us, so he is President and we cannot ask him more,” said Mr. Bongo, in the article. “He conducted elections and I think he won.”

“Mr. Bongo added that African leaders would not allow Western governments to dictate their view of Zimbabwe. ‘We have even received Mugabe as a hero,’ he said. ‘We understand the attacks but this is not the way they should react. What they’ve done is, in our opinion, a little clumsy, and we think they could have consulted us first.’ ”

Morgan Tsvangirai, who came first in a field of four in the first round in March, but the official count didn’t give him the margin needed to avoid a runoff against second-place finisher President Mugabe. Mr. Tsvangirai pulled out of the race charging widespread violence.

The Herald, Zimbabwe’s state-run newspaper, reported that a massive voter turnout was “a slap in the face for detractors who claimed this was a ‘Mugabe election’ that did not have the blessing of the generality of Zimbabweans.”

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown had urged African nations to help bring an end to Mugabe’s rule, and called the election a “new low” in Zimbabwe’s affairs. The upcoming African Union summit in Egypt is “an opportunity for the region to restore hope to the people of Zimbabwe. Democracy will ultimately prevail,” he said in a statement.

Meanwhile the international aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres said that South Africa had deported some 450 Zimbabweans overnight from a border detention center who were “fleeing instability and political violence.”

Siobhan McCarthy, a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Home Affairs, said she didn’t know “the particulars of this case. “My assumption would be that they would be in the country illegally and do not qualify for refugee status and therefore were returned to Zimbabwe,” McCarthy said.

Mr. Mugabe, who has led the country since independence in 1980, was once hailed as a post-independence leader committed to development and reconciliation. In recent years, in particular, as he has pushed land reforms, charges of corruption and oppression have surfaced.

Associated Press writers Celean Jacobson and Michelle Faul in Johannesburg, South Africa; Paul Schemm in Sharm El-Sheik, Egypt and Deb Riechmann in Washington contributed to this report. Final Call staffers also contributed to this report.

Related links:

Zimbabwe, African liberation and decolonisation (Jamaica Gleaner, 07-06-2008)

Zimbabwe Ambassador: Self-determination is at root of conflict (FCN Interview, 04-22-2008)