Violence conducted by Zimbabwe’s security forces is spreading as they randomly beat up members of the public while swooping through neighbourhoods on the lookout for opposition supporters, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Thursday.
”There is a broader element of repression that is taking place at the moment … We have documented cases of ordinary Zimbabweans becoming victims of the Zimbabwe security forces,” HRW researcher Tiseke Kasambala told reporters in Johannesburg as she presented the findings of her two-week visit.
The New York-based HRW documented examples of increased police brutality during a recent field trip to the troubled Southern African country and warned that the unrest is only likely to intensify.
”Police forces have been going door-to-door beating people up in their homes. The main reason we found for this [the beatings] is that they are accused of supporting the Movement for Democratic Change [MDC],” she said.
Kasambala told the story of how one family, who were not supporters of the MDC, were viciously beaten by police who had accused them of being followers of the main opposition party.
She noted examples of citizens being taken away by police and being brutalised for having suspected links to the opposition party.
”We recorded a spate of abductions of innocent civilians,” she said.
Tapera Kapuya, coordinator of the National Constitutional Assembly in South Africa, confirms the violence and abductions and speaks of a systematic pattern. ”We are beginning to notice that there is a systematic pattern of abduction and brutal violence and that the attacks are much more profound in the urban townships and rural areas around Matapela.”
Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has come in for widespread international condemnation over the arrest and subsequent assault of dozens of MDC activists, including party leader Morgan Tsvangirai, earlier this month.
Kasambala said that the government’s hard-line tactics are only likely to further inflame the situation in a country where unemployment now stands at about 80% and food shortages are widespread.
”People are getting angry. The abuses taking place are only going to lead to further violence and unrest in Zimbabwe,” she said.