President Mugabe of Zimbabwe prepared to meet European leaders today at the EU-Africa summit in Lisbon as Gordon Brown's lieutenants defended his decision to boycott the event.

Mr Mugabe, whose regime is widely condemned for its human rights abuses and lack of democratic freedoms, flew into the Portuguese capital late yesterday after finally securing an invitation to the summit in spite of Mr Brown’s best efforts to block him. There is to be no British representation at the ministerial level, with only Baroness Amos, the former International Development Secretary, attending.

David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, insisted the Government was right to take such a stand.

“It would have been absurd for the Prime Minister or myself to sit next to Robert Mugabe through a discussion of good governance and human rights and pretend that there wasn’t absolute meltdown going on in Zimbabwe,” he said.

“The use that would have been put by our presence by Robert Mugabe would have been quite counter-productive."

The summit was envisaged as a forum for the leaders of Europe and Africa to forge new ties and reinvigorate efforts on matters such as trade, the environment, human rights and security. But such issues look set to be overshadowed by the presence of Mr Mugabe, who is usually banned from the European Union over his alleged rigging of his 2002 re-election.

As leaders gathered ahead of tonight’s gala dinner, the British Government renewed its criticism of the Zimbabwean regime’s “brutal tyranny” with a scathing opinion piece by two Cabinet ministers in a Portuguese daily.

Writing in Publico, Mr Miliband and Douglas Alexander, the International Development Secretary, insisted that London was committed to a new era in relations with Africa despite the absence of any British minister from the two-day summit, which opens formally on Saturday morning.

They also pledged to help Zimbabwe rebuild its infrastructure and economy “if freedom can be re-established.”

However they launched an offensive against Mr Mugabe, who has ruled the former British colony since independence in 1980, for overseeing brutal attacks on opponents and gagging critics in the media.

“A solution for the problems of Zimbabwe needs to be found urgently,” they wrote. While voicing support of elections scheduled for March next year, the ministers called for a series of moves to ensure a free and fair vote.

“The abolition of draconian security laws, an end to violence against the opposition, a respect for press freedom, independent observers and an independent electoral commission” were all vital pre-requisites for the vote, said the ministers.

Mr Brown drew stinging criticism for his refusal to sit down with Mr Mugabe from the President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso.

“If you are an international leader then you are going to have to be prepared to meet some people your mother would not like you to meet. That is what we haveto do from time to time,” he said.

However he promised that leaders would not turn a blind eye to allegations of human rights abuses.

“There has been a very negative trend in the Zimbabwe regime and this is something we will have to broach,” Barroso said.“But this is not just a summit to look at Zimbabwe."

EU leaders see the summit as a chance to embark on a new era of European-African relations and consign the master-servant dynamic to the colonial history books.

“This summit must mark the end of a relationship rooted in conservatism and sometimes in prejudice on both sides and mark the start of a recognition of the real opportunities that are at hand for both sides."said EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel.

But the stand-off between the British and Zimbabwean leaders has only underlined the difficulties of exorcising the spectres of the colonial era.

Mr Mugabe frequently casts British criticism of his regime’s abuses as an imperialist crusade against the former colony, and appears to have largely convinced other southern African leaders of this view.

Mr Brown’s campaign to have Mr Mugabe barred was derailed when other regional leaders threatened to boycott the event in solidarity. All but a handful of Africa's 53 leaders are due at the summit, including the newly rehabilitated Libyan ruler Moammar Gaddafi, who has set up his tent on the outskirts of town.

However the Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu lent a note of support to Mr Brown's position, urging EU leaders to speak up rather than condone abuses with their silence.

“I would expect that they [European Union leaders] would criticise any regime that violates human rights because if you don’t, you are condoning those violations. The violators will think you are on their side,” Archbishop Tutu said.

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