Britain forced Zimbabwe on to the UN Security Council agenda yesterday as regional efforts to resolve the election stand-off faltered.

Sir John Sawers, Britain’s UN Ambassador, won agreement for the 15-nation council to hear a briefing on the crisis from a senior UN official, probably on Tuesday. The British move is a possible prelude to seeking UN backing for an arms embargo on Zimbabwe because of the risk of election-related repression.

The disclosure came as riot police raided the headquarters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change in Harare and detained about 100 supporters who had sought sanctuary there.

The MDC, which claims victory in the March 29 elections, said that more than 200 armed police raided the building, taking prisoners away on a bus along with computers used during the election campaign. Results for the presidential poll have still not been released, but President Mugabe’s Zanu (PF) party lost its parliamentary majority at the ballot box.

Britain is unlikely to be able to secure the votes to impose a UN arms embargo on Mr Mugabe’s regime, a move that in any case could be vetoed by China. The Security Council could, however, endorse a de facto moratorium on arms shipments by Zimbabwe’s neighbours, who blocked a shipload of Chinese arms from reaching the country’s ruling party.

Britain succeeded in getting the Security Council to schedule a briefing on Zimbabwe despite reluctance from such influential members as South Africa and China. The move takes UN involvement a step further, after Gordon Brown raised Zimbabwe at a Security Council summit on Africa last week.

Britain acted now so that the UN briefing on Zimbabwe would take place under the chairmanship of South Africa, before Britain assumes the rotating presidency of the Security Council on May 1. No council member objected to the British proposal, knowing that Britain had the nine votes needed to win.

“We are not opposed to the briefing on Zimbabwe being made in the Security Council. However, we wonder what value it can add,” Dumisani Kumalo, South Africa’s UN Ambassador, told reporters.

A Chinese diplomat said the crisis should be addressed by the African Union. “Zimbabwe is facing a similar situation to Kenya,” the official said.

Zimbabwe was first discussed by the Security Council in July 2005 after President Mugabe’s brutal slum clearance programme, known as Operation Murambatsvina, or Operation Drive Out Trash. At that time, Britain won a procedural vote, where vetos do not count, for the council to hear a report by UN special envoy Anna Tibaijuka calling the demolition of homes a “disastrous venture”.

Zimbabwe came before the Security Council again in December 2005 when Jan Egeland, the UN’s humanitarian chief, called for action on the food crisis in the country as part of a wider briefing on African crises. The Security Council also received a briefing from a UN humanitarian official in March 2007 after the opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, was arrested and beaten in custody.

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