9:35am UK, Friday July 04, 2008

Zimbabwe will remain a full member of the International Cricket Council, an official has said, after the deeply divided world body agreed a last-minute compromise.

The Zimbabwe cricket team at the World Cup in the West Indies

The ICC Executive Board, meeting for an unscheduled third day in Dubai, agreed to keep Zimbabwe in its fold.

The decision came after the troubled African nation acceded to India’s request to pull out of next year’s World Twenty20 championships in England.

The British Government had already made it clear it would not issue visas to Zimbabwean cricketers, which could have forced the ICC to move the lucrative tournament out of England.

Robert Mugabe

Zimbabwe Cricket Union president Peter Chingoka said his country had voluntarily pulled out of the event.

He said: ”Zimbabwe has agreed not to participate in the Twenty20 world championships in the wider interest of cricket.

“But we will continue to be a full member of the ICC and welcome any team that wants to play against us.

“We voluntarily agreed to back out of the Twenty20 Worlds because we were told we won’t get visas to England.

“We don’t want to gatecrash where we are not welcome.”

The cricket boards of South Africa and England last week suspended bilateral ties with Zimbabwe in protest at the deteriorating political situation in Harare, where Robert Mugabe was controversially re-elected as president.

Morgan Tsvangirai, of the opposition Movement For Democratic Change, pulled out of the presidential run-off amid mounting political violence.

While England and South Africa wanted Zimbabwe to be suspended from the ICC, the Asian bloc – led by the game’s commercial powerhouse India – opposed the move.