Zimbabweans flee to South Africa because they know their neighbors enjoy political freedom and opportunities, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said.

"They can't live in their own country," Clinton said Saturday during a visit to a Cape Town, South Africa, housing development. "And people come to South Africa because you're free and you're dynamic and you're making progress and you're working together. And you have political freedom."

She said it was "tragic" that Zimbabweans "don't have the same kind of opportunities in their own countries."

Sanctions were taken against Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's government because it "has turned its back on its own people," said Clinton, in the midst of an 11-day, seven-country mission to the continent.

"I mean, people in Zimbabwe are starving; that's why they come here (to South Africa)," she said of Zimbabwe, wracked by political and economic upheaval for years. "They have no work; that's why they come here. The schools are shut. The hospitals are not working."

The sanctions are meant to pressure the leadership "to do what it should do to take care of their own people."

She also acknowledged the quiet diplomacy South African leaders have undertaken concerning Zimbabwe, saying current and former leaders worked hard "to try to change the attitude" of Mugabe's party.