Posted on 08/24/2002 4:27:44 PM PDT by aculeus
Hundreds of girls as young as 12 are being raped or forcibly kept as concubines in rural Zimbabwe by President Robert Mugabe's youth militia as part of a campaign that human-rights lawyers have branded "systematic political cleansing" of the population.
A Rape victim in Mutare
"They are raping on a massive scale," said Frances Lovemore, a counsellor at the Harare-based Amani Trust which monitors torture. "Girls as young as 12 or 13 are being systematically taken and used and abused because of their families' political views."
The organisation is compiling video evidence that it hopes to use to help to bring Mr Mugabe to trial at the international court of human rights. An investigation by The Telegraph found that rape camps had been set up for youth militia and riot police in rural areas.
Victims living in hiding related how they had been gang-raped by police and self-styled war veterans, and had their genitals burnt with iron rods. They said that they had been abused in revenge for their parents not supporting Mr Mugabe, 78, in the presidential poll in March.
Other opponents of the government were badly beaten. As a final indignity, in a land where half the population is on the verge of starvation, victims claimed that militia members often urinated on the family food.
A former militia member recounted how he and others were instructed to attack wives and daughters of opposition sympathisers.
Human rights activists believe that this is part of a programme to drive out, kill or terrify into submission all those who oppose the president. Didymus Mutasa, the of Mr Mugabe's ruling Zanu-PF, has even spoken of halving the population to six million.
Details of the violence have emerged as world attention focuses on Mr Mugabe's campaign to evict white farmers while famine threatens.
Critics say the land reform programme is a cover for his war on opposition. "This isn't about race or land, it's about a political tyrant who wants to kill, break down and cripple all opposition," said Roy Bennett, a farmer who is an MP in Manicaland, eastern Zimbabwe, for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.
Gives a whole new meaning to "divide and conquer," doesn't it?
Gives a whole new meaning to "divide and conquer," doesn't it?
Please forgive my bleak humor -- I haven't quite gotten over the utter contempt I feel right now for more than a few people.
Africa has been descending to Hobbes' state-of-nature ever since the end of colonialism. PC prejudices in the West will prevent anything more than hand-wringing to be done for the unfortunate populations in those countries. At the same time the moral collapse in the West has those of us here well started on a similar path. In future years, dim memories of what we now remember as the 'Dark Ages' may be regarded as a nearly paradaisical high point of civilization. Just trying to be cheerful.
We should all be so lucky!
I am begining to be convinced that hell is better than most folks deserve!
Why is Zimbabwe and Mugabe different?
One error leading there is permitting our frustration to manifest itself as overly harsh condemnation of those with less understanding of what they're doing than we see. For those, repentence could be but a short reprimand away if only we'd summon the charity and courage to utter it.
I cannot be sure, but it seems to me quite just that it is an unforgiveable sin to see an opportunity to save another from themselves and then keep it to onesself. Once you tell them, but they persist -- well, you're off the hook.
Sins of that nature would make whatever portion of hell we sinners earn quite distasteful.
With that being said, and as far as being in the context of this thread, I find it again hard to disagree too much with you. Those who see Mugabe atrocity and yet turn a blind eye and never say anything would indeed be destined for a quite hot portion of hell.
He interjected.
talk to The Hand, le-roy.
Just part of the perils of being the World's Pragmatic Policeman.
CHARLIE ROSE: What are the implications for the future in terms of those who say, ``If you go to Kosovo with your bombs, then you have to be prepared for every other moral issue to take a position and be willing to use and employ your treasure and your men and women in the armed forces''?
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's a very troublesome question. And it's a very good question, and one to which there is no easy answer. But there is, nonetheless, an answer. Just because we cannot stop a crime everywhere we should not fail to stop a crime where we can stop it. The fact is we are in Europe. We have an alliance in Europe, therefore we can do something about what is happening in Kosovo. We can't go into Tibet without starting a massive, huge war with China. We are not present in other parts of the world with our forces and with allies and so forth. And then, last but not least, even a self-serving argument. What happens in Europe impacts on us much more. so, in that sense, yes, we cannot do it across the board. We cannot have a moral imperative on a universal scale. But it doesn't excuse us from the obligation of doing it where we can do it.
CHARLIE ROSE: So, we say to the Tibetans, ``You know, we can't do it because we don't want to get into a big deal with China, a fight with China.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right.
CHARLIE ROSE: ``They're too big and strong.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right.
CHARLIE ROSE: We said with Chechnya, ``We can't do it because morality plays no issue here because, you know, we don't want to get into a big conflict with the Russians.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: That's right. That is unfortunately--
CHARLIE ROSE: And we say to the Africans, ``We don't have a big stake here. It's Africa. It's not Europe, and so -- therefore -- we can't get involved.''
ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI: And we can support the African states doing-- You're absolutely right, Charlie. That's exactly the reality.
"Events in Kosovo" BRZEZINSKI SCOWCROFT LAVROV Interviews of 3/25/99
I haven't forgotten the Keunnelt-Leddihn post on colonialism I promised.
The only idea I've seen that even begins to explain the idiocy that has now carried on through several administrations, is a geo-strategic chess game with Russia/the Asian continent as the foreseeable goal (which requires one to accept the postulate that there are forces controlling our gov't. that are independent of particular administrations - and able to direct events/political figures spanning decades...an idea I will never accept, even if it turns out to be the truth).
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