By Nelson Banya
HARARE (Reuters) - The European Union joined calls on Monday for President Robert Mugabe to step down after 28 years ruling Zimbabwe, where spreading cholera and food shortages have worsened a desperate humanitarian crisis.
Mugabe's old foes in the West have renewed calls for his departure as the crisis has spiralled. Mugabe blames Western sanctions for Zimbabwe's collapse. Critics blame his increasingly authoritarian rule.
"I think the moment has arrived to put all the pressure for Mugabe to step down," said EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana before a meeting of European foreign ministers in Brussels.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said in a speech "I say today that President Mugabe must go. Zimbabwe has suffered enough."
The United States and Britain have made similar calls.
The EU meeting will consider whether to add up to 11 more names to a list of over 160 Zimbabwean officials -- including Mugabe -- who are banned from travelling to Europe, but Solana argued against any further sanctions on the ruined country.
South African officials were in Zimbabwe to assess the scale of the crisis, responding to an unprecedented call for international help from Mugabe's government.
Basic foodstuffs are running out and a cholera epidemic has killed at least 575 people, infected thousands and spread to South Africa, Mozambique, Botswana and Zambia. The South African delegation was due to report back late on Monday.
South Africa's health ministry said on Monday that eight people had died as a result of cholera in the Limpopo province bordering Zimbabwe.
Prices are doubling every 24 hours and the 100 million Zimbabwean dollar a week limit for bank withdrawals is only enough to buy three loaves of bread in the once relatively prosperous country.
CONTAMINATED WATER
Hopes of rescuing Zimbabwe have dimmed while deadlock continues between Mugabe and opposition rival Morgan Tsvangirai over forming a power-sharing government in line with a deal in September that followed widely condemned and violent elections.
The health system is incapable of coping with the cholera epidemic. The water system has collapsed, forcing people to drink from contaminated wells and streams.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said international intervention was needed because of the health emergency.
"Cholera is killing," he said. "We need international intervention for this matter, not a military one, but a strong intervention to stop this cholera epidemic, which could allow for other things," he said without elaborating.
Zimbabwe has accused former colonial power Britain of using the crisis and the cholera epidemic to rally Western support for an invasion of Zimbabwe.
"There is a crying need for change in Zimbabwe," Britain's foreign minister, David Miliband, said in Brussels.
Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga urged the African Union on Sunday to hold an emergency summit to formulate a resolution to send troops into Zimbabwe to deal with the crisis.
Botswanan Foreign Minister Phandu Skelemani and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a Nobel laureate, have also called for Mugabe's removal.
Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a statement issued by the Elders, a group of prominent figures that includes ex-U.S. President Jimmy Carter and Tutu that there was "bitter disappointment in the current leadership."
South Africa's powerful COSATU trade union federation said on Monday 38 members of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions arrested during protests last week remained in detention.
COSATU said in a statement it demanded the immediate release of the union members and called on the South African government delegation currently in Zimbabwe to investigate the detentions.
(Additional reporting by Ingrid Melander in Brussels, James Mackenzie and Francois Murphy in Paris and Paul Simao in Pretoria; Editing by Charles Dick)
