You might want to avoid Zimbabwe for your next family vacation

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Yet another example of the brutality of the Mugabe regime. Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai and others, 50 activists in all, were arrested by police during a prayer rally on Sunday and were horribly beaten by the police:

As the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) leader and the other activists were led away from the Harare court to a hospital for treatment, Mr Tsvangirai condemned their treatment by police.

"It's a horrible assault. A sadistic attack on defenceless people," he said.

Speaking to the BBC from the hospital, MP Tendai Biti, secretary-general of Mr Tsvangirai's faction of the MDC, described how he and his colleagues were beaten up.

"I can hardly walk. They were hitting me on the buttocks and on my legs, the fibula. I was assaulted while I was lying prostrate. There were others who were assaulted while standing and in the process tried to defend themselves, which is why we've got so many people with fractures of the hand and so forth.

"It was the most vicious assault I have ever witnessed," he said.

Mr Biti said Mr Tsvangirai was in "a very bad condition".

"I saw him being assaulted. There was a time when for 15 minutes they were assaulting him with their baton sticks non-stop. He has got a cracked skull and his face is puffed up and he has bruises all over. He must have passed out at least three times."

And they still face the criminal charge of "incitement to violence".

The sooner the world is rid of Robert Mugabe, the better.

(The Guardian has more here, The Washington Post here.)