UNITED States (US) ambassador to Zimbabwe Pamela Tremont has reportedly complained to government about alleged State security surveillance amid increased tension between Washington and Harare.
Tremont, who replaced Brian Nichols, assumed office in July this year.
A source privy to the matter told NewsDay that Tremont had become “weary about suspected surveillance and being trailed during her travels”.
“She (Tremont) recently sent a team to government officials to discuss the matter of her security,” the source said. “They came and presented their case. They said she had grown tired.”
The US embassy refused to be drawn into commenting on the matter.
Protocol does not allow diplomats to share details of correspondence between their offices and host governments.
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Foreign Affairs ministry deputy spokesperson Lynette Nguluvhe said they were yet to get such a report.
“There is no report of that nature that has come through diplomatic channels,” she said. “We await to hear from the US embassy.”
This is not the first time there has been friction between the Americans and Harare over surveillance.
Mostly, surveillance is done by members of the counter intelligence unit in the CIO or in the military intelligence.
Tremont’s complaints expose the ongoing tensions between Zimbabwe and the US and “running battles” between the two countries.
Last month, the US embassy in Harare was accused of having paid Google to flood local media websites with statements that there are no US sanctions on Zimbabwe on Anti-Sanctions Day. Sadc designated October 25 as Anti-Sanction Day to push for the removal of the embargo. The flooding of websites with messages to rebut what the government was pushing riled authorities.
Writing on X, presidential spokesperson George Charamba said: I think this Tremont girl they sent to us does not quite understand the Zimbabwean psyche. She will soon know hake. We don’t play when you angry us!”.
Diplomatic relations between the US and Zimbabwe soured in March this year when Washington accused local security agents of harassing, detaining and deporting several of its nationals who were in the country as aid workers.
The US Agency for International Development (USAid) said officials and contractors had been “verbally and physically” intimidated.
They were there to “support civic participation, democratic institutions and human rights”, the agency added.
Then, USAid administrator external Samantha Power said some of their members had been subjected to “overnight detention, transportation in unsafe conditions, prolonged interrogation, seizure of and intrusion into personal electronic equipment”.
Also at the same time, Matthew Miller, a spokesman for the US State Department said that the aid team was legally admitted to Zimbabwe to “support the government of Zimbabwe’s expressed commitment to democratic reform”, something Power called a “hollow” commitment.
In 2022, two aides of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee were involved in a high speed chase with suspected security agents.
The officials were in the country at the invitation of the US embassy in Zimbabwe to meet with human rights advocates and other civil society leaders over the country’s deteriorating political and human rights situation.
The officials, in a vehicle with diplomatic plates being driven by an embassy staffer, later realised they were being pursued and they drove back to the embassy.
Harare accuses Washington of allegedly interfering in its internal affairs as part of the regime change agenda. The world’s largest economy accuses Zimbabwe of violating basic tenets of governance, democracy and human rights.
Tremont is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, class of Minister-Counsellor and was assigned as the deputy chief of mission at the US embassy in Stockholm, Sweden.
Among her other roles, Tremont has been deputy director for Nato policy in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs at the State Department, the political/economic counsellor at the US embassy in Lusaka, Zambia and a political military officer at the US embassy in London, United Kingdom.
Tremont also served as political military officer at the US embassy in Ankara, Turkey, as a desk officer for South Africa in the Bureau of African Affairs and as a watch officer in the State Department’s Operations Centre.