Jul 16, 2005, 7:01 GMT
Wellington - New Zealand Foreign Minister Phil Goff confirmed Saturday that the government would not stop the national cricket team touring Zimbabwe next month.
Goff said the International Cricket Council (ICC) had told New Zealand diplomats in London it would only approve cancellation of the tour without imposing massive financial penalties if the government made it illegal.
Goff told Radio New Zealand the government, which is bitterly critical of President Robert Mugabes human rights abuses, would not copy him by denying New Zealanders the right to travel overseas.
He said the only way the tour could be stopped now was if New Zealand Cricket, the sport's national governing body, decreed its players would be in danger of their lives, and there was no sign it was ready to do that.
Henry Olonga, Zimbabwe's first black test cricketer, and Judith Todd, daughter of the former Rhodesia's elder statesman Sir Garfield Todd, joined about 400 New Zealanders in marching through Auckland on Saturday to protest the tour.
The government has announced it will ban the Zimbabwe team making a return tour of New Zealand at the end of the year by denying entry visas.
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