Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt - President Robert Mugabe, widely criticized over his disputed re-election, has arrived for the African summit set to begin Monday in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Mugabe was sworn in for a sixth term on Sunday after the vote, discredited as "a sham" by the opposition candidate Morgan Tsvangirai, was marred by violence.

There has been no consensus among the 53 members of the African Union over how to handle the crisis, although the organization has a rule not to accept leaders who have not been democratically elected.

But it is highly unlikely that the summit will put the rule into effect.

In a meeting ahead of the summit, African foreign ministers stopped short of criticizing in a draft resolution the election of Mugabe but decried violence and urged for a dialogue between Mugabe and Tsvangirai.

The Southern African Development Community (SADC), which has been mediating between Mugabe and Tsvangirai, is expected to present a proposal to the summit for a power-sharing arrangement similar to the power-sharing agreement in Kenya.

It was African mediation that led to the formation of a power- sharing government in Kenya in the wake of a disputed election earlier this year, sparking a wave of violence in which hundreds of people were killed.

Kenya itself is among the strongest critics of Mugabe. Its prime minister, Raila Odinga, is the champion of the idea of sending African troops into Zimbabwe.

The African Union's chief said the summit was not likely to find an immediate solution to the crisis in Zimbabwe.

"I am convinced it will be solved in a credible way. But please give us time to solve it with our heads of state," the union's commission chairman, Jean Ping, told reporters in Sharm el-Sheikh ahead of the summit.

On Sunday, Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa was rushed to hospital in Sharm el-Sheikh after suffering chest pain. But his condition is said to be stable. (dpa)