Zimbabwe's current plight "shames most Africans", former UN chief Kofi Annan said in an interview published on Friday, while voicing hope for a negotiated solution to the country's crisis.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner, offering to help resolve the standoff as he did earlier this year in Kenya, urged the the West not to let Zimbabwe's situation strengthen the image of Africa as a continent in crisis.

"Zimbabwe shames most Africans but at the same time it's wrong to judge the whole continent on what is happening there, it is not a litmus test for the region," he told The Observer newspaper.

"Mozambique came through a civil war extremely admirably. You have Botswana doing extremely well, Malawi is making great steps to improve food production," he said, according to the website of the weekly's sister paper the Guardian.

Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe has come under growing international pressure since elections in which the opposition Movement for Democratic Change won the first round, but boycotted the run-off due to pre-poll violence.

Efforts to broker an end to the crisis stepped up on Friday as South Africa hosted talks with the African Union's top official and a meeting of regional foreign ministers.

The Zimbabwean people

"We all applaud the courage of the Zimbabwean people," said Annan, who is head of the Africa Progress Panel, set up to monitor the development promises made by the Group of Eight (G8) richest countries.

"They turned out en masse to express their will at the first election and we have to make sure that the Zimbabwean government understands that the will of the people has to be enforced."

Annan, who played a key role in negotiating an end to the political stalemate in Kenya after disputed presidential elections in December, said he believed a solution to the Zimbabwe standoff is possible.

"In Kenya one of the issues was whether there should be a rerun of the election. ... I got them to understand it was never going to happen and it was important for them to put their country first."

"More and more in Africa the understanding is that you elect people who respect the will of the people," he said, adding that in Zimbabwe "a peace deal is doable".

"Each crisis has its own dynamics, its own personality, but in Zimbabwe, the leaders are also going to be held to account by the people and will have to accept that will of the people."

Asked if he could help negotiate he said: "Of course I would help because I am an African," adding: "They are talking of sending UN envoys in... I have talked to people involved and I would of course offer advice and my services."

Sapa