By Serena Chaudry
LUSAKA (Reuters) - Southern African leaders called onSunday for the expeditious release of results from Zimbabwe'selection after a two-week delay that has raised fears ofviolence.
Zambian Foreign Minister Kabinga Pande told reporters a13-hour summit in Lusaka had "urged the electoral authoritiesin Zimbabwe that verification and release of results areexpeditiously done in accordance with the due process of law".
He said the summit of the 14-nation Southern AfricanDevelopment Community had also urged President Robert Mugabe toensure that a possible run-off vote against opposition leaderMorgan Tsvangirai be held "in a secure environment".
The opposition and human rights organisations have accusedMugabe of orchestrating a systematic campaign of violence inresponse to his ZANU-PF party's first defeat in a parliamentaryelection on March 29.
No results have been released yet from the parallelpresidential vote but Tsvangirai's Movement for DemocraticChange says he won outright and that Mugabe's 28-year rule isover.
The summit ran almost 10 hours over schedule and endedaround 5 a.m. (4 a.m. British time). A senior Zambian officialsaid earlier the delay was caused by a disagreement amongleaders over whether the post-election impasse should be calleda crisis.
But Pande, in response to questions, said: "It is not acrisis at all."
In Harare, an electoral official said 23 constituencies inthe election would be recounted, raising new uncertainty overthe vote and opening the possibility that ZANU-PF couldoverturn its defeat in the parliamentary poll.
(Additional reporting by Serena Chaudry and Shapi Shacindain Lusaka, MacDonald Dzirutwe, Nelson Banya, StellaMapenzauswa, Muchena Zigomo in Harare and Sue Thomas inJohannesburg; Writing by Barry Moody; Editing by Ralph Gowling)
