Zimbabwean opposition chief brutally beaten

HARARE, Zimbabwe — Zimbabwe’s most prominent opposition leader was seriously injured — with deep gashes on his head and shoulders — from beatings and torture by police who broke up a public meeting that had been declared illegal, colleagues said yesterday.

Morgan Tsvangirai, head of the Movement for Democratic Change, was in a suburban jail, said his wife, Susan, who was allowed to visit a day after he was detained at Sunday’s meeting of the “Save Zimbabwe Campaign.” She said some of her husband’s wounds had been sutured and heavily bandaged, and one eye was badly swollen.

Lawyers said at least five other opposition, anti-government and civic leaders were among the scores of people arrested in the latest crackdown on dissent by President Robert Mugabe’s security forces and political supporters.

The 83-year-old Mr. Mugabe has been blamed by opponents for repression, corruption, acute food shortages, deepening economic woes and inflation of about 1,600 percent — the highest in the world.

Police said they fatally shot one demonstrator when they broke up Sunday’s meeting in the western suburb of Highfield with tear gas, a water cannon and live ammunition.

Among the injured was opposition leader Lovemore Madhuku, who collapsed after being assaulted by police and was taken to the main hospital in Harare, where he was in serious condition, according to the Save Zimbabwe Campaign.

Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena said police arrested Mr. Tsvangirai, 55, and other top party officials as they “instigated people to come out and commit acts of violence.”

He said one man was fatally shot when 200 opposition party “thugs” attacked about 20 policemen. Organizers identified the dead protester as Gift Tandare, an activist of Mr. Tsvangirai’s opposition group.

Mr. Bvudzijena told state TV that three police officers were hospitalized with injuries.

In Washington, the State Department condemned the crackdown, saying it was shocked by reports of injuries suffered by opposition leaders.

The attacks “were an indication of the repressive nature of the Mugabe dictatorship,” deputy spokesman Tom Casey said, urging the government to provide medical treatment for victims and to release them as soon as possible.

Organizers of Sunday’s prayer meeting — an alliance of opposition, civic society, church leaders and student and anti-government groups — said Mr. Tsvangirai fainted three times after being beaten by police.

“This is not consistent with the normal police brutality we have witnessed. The injuries were deliberate and an attempt to assassinate him,” said top opposition official Eliphas Mukonoweshure.

Since founding the Movement for Democratic Change in 1999, the first major challenge to Mr. Mugabe’s ruling Zimbabwe Africa National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) party, Mr. Tsvangirai was seldom seen in the forefront of defiant anti-government street protests, preferring a strategy of lower profile civil disobedience.

In 2005, some opposition colleagues began questioning whether Mr. Tsvangirai could bring down Mr. Mugabe and his party.

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