Swaziland's prime minister yesterday denied retracting a statement that caused the mass resignation of the country's Appeals Court judges last year and plunged the tiny southern African country into a constitutional crisis.

The six judges, who are all South Africans, appeared to have reached an agreement with King Mswati III at the weekend, after earlier saying they would return to the bench only if the monarch undertook to comply with court orders.

The statement in question was issued in November last year.

It refers to a judgment the Court of Appeal handed down in favour of people returning to land in eastern Swaziland from which they had been evicted to make way for Mswati's brother, Prince Maguga.

The Appeals Court ruled that the evictees should return to the land, only to have its decision overturned by Attorney General Phesheya Dlamini, who said it undermined Mswati's authority to legislate.

Shortly after the meeting last weekend the government, the monarchy and the judges released a joint statement saying: "His Majesty's government wishes to unconditionally retract the contents of the November 28 statement that the judges of the court of appeal were influenced by external forces in their work and that they were not independent in forming those judgements in question".

But Prime Minister Sibusiso Dlamini declared in a written declaration yesterday: "The statement still stands and whoever said we withdrew the statement was ill-informed and I want to categorically state we only withdraw a few lines of that statement to the effect that the judges had entertained outside influence before issuing the judgments". – Sapa.