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Zimbabwe: Lawyer was threatened by Harare police – NGO

WARNING: This is Version 1 of my old archive, so Photos will NOT work and many links will NOT work. But you can find articles by searching on the Titles. There is a lot of information in this archive. Use the SEARCH BAR at the top right. Prior to December 2012; I was a pro-Christian type of Conservative. I was unaware of the mass of Jewish lies in history, especially the lies regarding WW2 and Hitler. So in here you will find pro-Jewish and pro-Israel material. I was definitely WRONG about the Boeremag and Janusz Walus. They were for real.

Original Post Date: 2007-03-22 Time: 00:00:00  Posted By: Jan

Johannesburg – Zimbabwean police officers allegedly threatened a lawyer from the Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights group after he handed them a court order, said a Johannesburg-based non-governmental organisation on Sunday.

Andrew Makoni attempted to serve police from Zimbabwe’s Law and Order Unit a court order indicting them from further interference with the body of Gift Tandare, a young activist shot and killed by police in last weekend’s crackdown, wrote the Open Society for Southern Africa Initiative’s Isabella Matambanadzo in a statement.

However, the commanding officer allegedly tore up the court order and threatened him and his colleagues with “disappearance” should they continue to act for victims of the crackdown.

Makoni had been forced to undergo an extensive search on entry to the department, was allegedly told he was carrying “arms of war” and that lawyers were facilitating what police alleged to be violence perpetrated by the opposition.

The commanding officer then allegedly ordered the officers in attendance to arrest Makoni if he was again seen on the premises before he was ordered to get out, said Matambanadzo.

Nicole Fritz, director of the Southern Africa Litigation Centre said: “The actions of Zimbabwe’s Law and Order Unit have to be condemned in the strongest terms.

“Even the most repressive societies generally respect the role of lawyers and understand that if some semblance of the rule of law is to be maintained, you cannot go about threatening the physical security and well-being of legal representatives.”

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) condemned the recent wave of violence by the Zimbabwean state forces. This included reports that police stole Tandare’s body and buried it near his rural home in Mount Darwin, wrote Cosatu spokesperson Patrick Craven in a statement on Sunday.

They then allegedly forced his father to go to the grave at gunpoint. The Movement for Democratic Change’s lawyers said the government had no legal basis to demand his corpse and filed a high court application to compel the government to return it.

“If true, these reports confirm Cosatu’s view that the government is systematically and ruthlessly crushing all democratic rights,” said Craven.

The union federation has demanded the immediate release of all those arrested and insisted that the police return Tandare’s body to his family for his funeral, scheduled for Monday. – Sapa

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=68&art_id=nw20070318225720330C482761