Mugabe 'overjoyed' to host rare VIP visitor in China's Xi

HARARE: China's President Xi Jinping visited Zimbabwe on Tuesday on a rare trip by a world leader to a country shunned by Western powers over President Robert Mugabe's widely-criticised record on human rights.

Xi was greeted at the airport by Mugabe, 91, who has ruled since independence in 1980, as hundreds of children waved Chinese and Zimbabwean flags along the road into the capital Harare.