No painkillers, no visitors and no way out: Mugabe's hospital ward for MDC activists
The fact that he has successfully stolen the Zimbabwean election has not halted the violence which Mugabe continues to heap upon those who opposed him.
Indeed, there are stories that badly wounded men are being denied treatment in Zimbabwe and are instead being held prisoner in Ward B3 of Gokwe general hospital.
The opposition Movement for Democratic Change says that at least 13 of its members are held in the ward. Medical staff say they are mostly kept prisoner in side rooms.
"They have all been heavily assaulted," said one of the staff. "Some are burned beyond recognition. Some have broken limbs. They are in serious agony. They have no drugs. They are not allowed to leave. When doctors from the outside tried to bring the medicines they were turned away. So were ambulances to take them to private hospitals with drugs. It is all on the orders of the army and Central Intelligence Organisation."
This refusal to offer treatment is being carried out against burns victims and people who have suffered injury from axe wounds.
And, it is against this background that China and Russia have vetoed UN action in Zimbabwe, urged on by Mbeki, Mugabe's greatest enabler.Most of the men held against their will are victims of state-orchestrated violence that has continued against the opposition since the widely derided election that returned Mugabe to power a fortnight ago.
The MDC leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, told the Guardian that the treatment of the men on Ward B3 is further evidence that the state-orchestrated campaign of killings, torture and abductions has continued after the election.
"We have been saying that the regime has been waging war on its own people and this is further proof," he said. "This is why it is so urgent that the African Union and UN move so urgently as every day that passes more innocent people are losing their lives in this orgy of violence."
Gordon Brown has been very vocal about ending both the violence in Zimbabwe and Mugabe's rule of that country. However, one can't help but think that if Zimbabwe produced oil, then all of our proposed interventions would be of a much more military nature.
Mugabe is getting away with this brutality because the Zimbabweans have nothing that we want.
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