Zimbabwean police have brutally beaten hundreds of activists and ordinary people in recent months after a crackdown on dissent by President Robert Mugabe’s government, a rights group said on Wednesday.
Human Rights Watch said police had been randomly arresting and beating up Zimbabweans they accuse of supporting the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) since its leader Morgan Tsvangirai was detained and beaten in March.
”Arbitrary arrests, detentions and brutal beatings by police and security forces skyrocketed in March and April and continue unabated,” Georgette Gagnon, deputy African director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.
Zimbabwe’s government has repeatedly warned of tough action against opposition supporters it accuses of mounting a ”terrorist campaign” to topple it at the behest of Mugabe’s critics in London and Washington.
Human Rights Watch, in a report entitled Bashing Dissent: Escalating violence and state repression in Zimbabwe, said police went on a two-week rampage in March, randomly beating people in the streets, in shopping malls and beer halls in suburbs of the capital Harare, which are considered opposition strongholds.
Police went house to house beating people with batons and had imposed an informal curfew in some Harare suburbs as high levels of repression continue, the group said after a two-week fact-finding mission in the Southern African country.
”Right now, no one walks about after 7pm unless you want a beating,” Human Rights Watch quoted one resident of a Harare suburb as saying.
The group urged Zimbabwe’s police and security forces to halt the excessive use of force against protesters and to stop intimidating and beating activists and ordinary people.
The government has banned protests and rallies across much of Harare since March, when police clashed with opposition supporters.
Once one of Africa’s most prosperous countries, Zimbabwe has experienced economic meltdown as inflation tops 2 000% and ordinary people struggle with unemployment at more than 80% and widespread shortages of food and fuel.
Critics blame Mugabe but the veteran leader says Western sanctions have plunged the economy into crisis.
South Africa has maintained its policy of quiet diplomacy toward Zimbabwe, but President Thabo Mbeki has agreed to mediate talks between Mugabe and the MDC.
Human Rights Watch urged the regional powerhouse to take a tougher line with Mugabe and said Southern African nations should investigate allegations of human rights abuses there.
‘Interests of justice’
Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s home affairs minister told a court not to grant bail to 13 detained opposition activists because they were a threat to peace and security, reports said on Wednesday.
Kembo Mohadi issued a ministerial certificate that was presented in court on Monday just as a magistrate was about to deliver his ruling on an application to have the men released, the state- controlled Herald newspaper said.
”There is real likelihood that the accused persons would undermine peace or security if set free, therefore refusal to grant bail and detention of the accused persons in custody will be in the interests of justice,” Mohadi was quoted as saying. — Reuters, Sapa-dpa