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Zimbabwe Professor Arrested and Tortured For Watching Online News Videos

Posted by Roblimo on from the let's-not-go-there-on-vacation-this-year dept.

An anonymous submitter wrote: "Disturbing reports have come out of Zimbabwe about how a professor who regularly held gatherings to discuss different news topics and social issues, was arrested, charged with treason and tortured for having the audacity to gather the regular group of about 45 people who discuss these things, and showing them some BBC and Al Jazeera news clips about the uprising in Egypt and Tunisia." Quote from the article: "Under dictator Robert Mugabe, watching internet videos in Zimbabwe can be a capital offense, it would seem. The videos included BBC World News and Al-Jazeera clips, which Gwisai had downloaded from Kubatana, a web-based activist group in Zimbabwe."

35 of 224 comments (clear)

  1. Re:s/watch/show/ by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Oh awesome, phew.
    For a second there, I didn't think they had a legitimate reason to torture the guy.
    Thanks for clearing that up!

  2. Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Securityemo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    And not just a faceless human. Seriously, not flamebait. This is why the civilized world should act in force, and not just lamely sit around and ship food and medicine to these hellholes.

    --
    Emotions! In your brain!
    1. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by h4rr4r · · Score: 2

      Honestly, what can we do?

      If we topple Mugabe, we will be seen the same way the Iraqi's see us, as what we are, an occupying force.

      The people themselves need to be the ones to secure their own freedom.

    2. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by h4rr4r · · Score: 3

      No one likes an occupation.
      No one wants foreigners telling them how to run their nation.

      Would they like us to build them power plants? Sure. Would they want us to give them running water? Of course. Do they want us forming their government for them the way we did in Afghanistan and Iraq? No way in hell.

    3. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Securityemo · · Score: 2

      Who cares about cultural identity or national borders when you don't have enough to eat, your children won't receive a proper education, and your life and freedom in any case is at the whim and mercy of whoever has the guns?

      --
      Emotions! In your brain!
    4. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by jklovanc · · Score: 2

      There is a huge difference between Iraq and Zimbabwe. In Zimbabwe the opposition party has win most of the recent elections but Mugabe will not give up power. Unlike Iraq where there were a number of violently competing faction vying for power there is already a viable elected replacement government in Zimbabwe. Take a look at the Movement for Democratic Change party. There was supposed to be a run off in the last election but the MDC candidate withdrew citing the probability of his supporters being murdered. Mugabe, like many African dictators, is in his last days of power and trying to hold on at all costs.

    5. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by h4rr4r · · Score: 2

      Sure, but letting his people get rid of him is better for everyone. We are not the world police, we are not going to make any friends by taking over yet another country.

    6. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Urza9814 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      When did our options become limited to invasion or not doing a damn thing? How about we start with some diplomatic action? Or even just public demonstrations? No nation can survive on it's own. And dictators actually do sometimes care about how they look to the outside world - that's why they try to keep stuff like this silent.

    7. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Securityemo · · Score: 2

      Why would they? The situation in Iraq resulted from there quite simply not being enough boots on the ground to keep the area safe and root out the warring forces kept in check by the Saddam regime. A top-rank general quit over this, referring to established doctrine on occupation and refusing to be involved. Everyone fell on each others throats, seeking power. That doesn't necessarily carry over to other situations, either for want of manpower or for the presence of powder-keg political situations.

      --
      Emotions! In your brain!
    8. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by xrobertcmx · · Score: 2

      It might have been better if we (The US) hadn't just sat on our hands and let this nut job take power back in 79/80. If I recall correctly it was the UK which effectively handed him power. He ran Zanu PF which was more or less a terrorist group.

    9. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Securityemo · · Score: 2

      If I went seriously ill, you'd be damn right I'd be happy if someone ran my house and prevented me from dying. And in a long-term scenario, if the bombs fell and you or anyone else managed to become a feudal lord or other autocratic ruler of some kind, offering the only available shelter from roving bandits and control over irrigation or such, I'd most certainly pledge allegiance as long as that wasn't worse than the bandits or starvation. I assume most other people would, as well.

      --
      Emotions! In your brain!
    10. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by internettoughguy · · Score: 2

      So they want us to save them from the big bad dictator but they don't want us to stick around so another big bad dictator can't come into power?

      You can't have it both ways.

      I suppose you've forgotten about Ngo Dinh Diem, Fulgencio Batista, Augusto Pinochet and so on, US interventionism doesn't prevent dictatorships, it creates them.

    11. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by jelizondo · · Score: 2

      You forgot to provide examples of US support for the removal of Batista and Pinochet or to deny USG and US Corporations in installing them in the first place.

      Also please provide said examples for General Videla (Argentina), Anastasio Somoza (Guatemala), Trujillo and Belaguer (Dominican Republic), this last one installed at gun-point by US Marines...And that is only in Latin America, if we throw in Asia and Africa, whew! you would have a lot of work.

      --
      Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never, ever get it out. - Cardinal Wolsey
    12. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by khallow · · Score: 2

      How about we start with some diplomatic action? Or even just public demonstrations?

      I thought you were going to advocate something other than "not doing a damn thing". For what it's worth, how the US treats Cuba (prohibiting companies which do business with the regime from doing business in the US) provides some sort of intermediate sanction. Things like no fly zones (how the US treated Iraq prior to the Iraqi invasion) are another. These seem pathologically passive-aggressive to me, but it's a start, I suppose.

    13. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by FuckingNickName · · Score: 2

      All that would be required one SEAL tam to go in, apprehend Mugabe

      UN and OAS - they have their place, I guess. But when in doubt - send the Marines!

    14. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by TheRaven64 · · Score: 2

      They've got to be protected,
      All their rights respected,
      'Till somebody we like can be elected.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    15. Re:Oh, look it's someone we can relate to by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      This is why it worked in Europe after WW2. The situation could not have been more favorable for the US.

      1) The population was fed up with the war, the Nazis and everything. Even US (hell, for some even USSR) occupation was considered better than that. That situation is still there, and you will notice that (as in your example) many people will welcome the US as a liberation force, even if it means occupation.

      2) The US sent aid. And I don't mean "built some factories". They sent food, they sent medication, they sent clothing. They sent what the people needed to survive and the people LOVED the US for that. You can still, 60 years after, hear people talk very favorably about the US and ignore anything they have done recently, simply because of that.

      3) There was the "evil Russian" right next door. That occupation force (which lasted 'til the 1990s, btw, and some bases still exist) was seen as a safeguard against the aggressors across the border. That's something we lack today.

      4) The US showed that there is keen interest in handing the country back to its people. And here's where the whole thing starts to crumble. Now, the US cannot do that because of the 'terrorists'. And they only exist because they omitted step 2: Win the people, not just the war. After any war is over, there will of course still be sympathizers for the old regime or even a different regime. They are, though, usually the minority. A war against people who despise your government more than their own cannot be won. For reference, see Russia vs. Afghanistan. And the outlook was very favorable at the end of the conquest of Iraq, there was a very strong pro-US sentiment in the country. What the US failed to do was to shower the people with supplies to clearly show them that they are there to aid, help and be the friend of the Iraqis. Building factories ain't going to cut it when around the corner there's the guy from Al Quaida handing out bread.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  3. This happens in more places than Zimbabwe alone. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Manning, Assange, everyone in that concentration camp the US has build. All political opponents. Easy to verify also, hence the lack of proof and fair trails. This article seems like selected indignation to be honest. Sure it's bad, but this guy got tortured once... the US does this every day to many hundrerds, if nog thousands of people. At least this guy got to talk the press about it. He actually got a better treatment than the self-proclaimed good-guy of the world gives him. And to be honest... it's no surprise to most people any more that torture by Zimbabwe is better than 'justice' in the US.
    So my US friends, instead of going into an open and fair debat, I wish you all good luck with just ignoring the truth and mod this troll. As usual here.

  4. Traded racist white rule for evil black psycho by judeancodersfront · · Score: 2

    life doesn't always work out as planned.

  5. Thank god. by a+whoabot · · Score: 2

    Thank god Mugabe and his supporters overthrew those white supremacists so many years ago, and now the people of Zimbabwe can live in freedom and security.

    1. Re:Thank god. by a+whoabot · · Score: 2

      It's a non-sequitur to point out that the regime which overthrew the last regime while promising a better political/social order has not delivered.

      Okay then...

      I'm sorry I don't have the silver bullet for the country's woes. An initial idea might be the removal of the Mugabe regime. Pointing out the faults of that regime might actually be a start in the removal of it, actually.

  6. Re:s/watch/show/ by jklovanc · · Score: 2

    It is not only "still possible the people he showed it to were arrested" it is a fact. As the article stated, all 45 people at the meeting was arrested and charged.

  7. Mugabe by MarkvW · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Even somebody as awful as Mugabe has supporters enough to keep him in power. Same with Hitler. Same with Saddam.

    The trick to being a good dictator is to satisfy a hard-core minority of your supporters so that they will control the majority.

  8. Re:Mugabe: Proof that Carter was worst Prez ever by artor3 · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Gitmo can't be shut down because Americans are too spineless to lock up the prisoners on our soil.
    Troops in Iraq are being drawn down responsibly. It was a mistake to go in, but that doesn't mean we should make it worse by yanking everyone out at once.
    Troops in Afghanistan were always supported by virtually everyone.
    The tax rates were extended because the fascist GOP held unemployment benefits hostage. "Give us billions in tax cuts, or we let millions of innocent people die in the streets!"
    I also note that you don't even mention the unmitigated disasters that are Medicare Part D, No Child Left Behind, and a full-hearted embrace of torture.

    I'll give you the Patriot Act and the wiretaps. Still, the balance is very heavily against your boy Bush. When even Republican sweethearts like Donald Trump are calling him the worst president in American history, it takes a special kind of willful ignorance to pretend he was anything but a catastrophe.

  9. 30 years ago by Vinegar+Joe · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Mugabe was the darling of the Left. But you know something? The people of Zimbabwe were safer, freer and better fed under Ian Smith.

    --
    "The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
    1. Re:30 years ago by Frangible · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yep. Countdown to someone calling you a racist in 5... 4.... anyway, Rhodesia wasn't perfect, but under Mugabe's "enlightened" slaughter of the white man, things went from being Africa's breadbasket as Rhodesia to widespread starvation that aid programs struggle to meet. The murdered whites' land was given to his cronies that didn't know the first thing about farming -- they were soldiers, thugs, and death squads, not agriculturalists.

      Mugabe has been doing this sort of thing for a very, very long time. How it's any surprise to anyone is beyond me.

      Go to Wikipedia and look at Mugabe's list of honorary degrees -- most of which have now been withdrawn -- and the comments people made when awarding them to him. He hasn't changed. The people who laughed at and support his earlier genocide are now just realizing that Mugabe has never been a nice guy, at all.

      I do not support apartheid or white minority rule, but there are better ways to move the country forward than murder of all political opposition and everyone of a certain skin color. Yes, the white minority governments in Africa did this as well, but it was wrong when they did it, and it is wrong now. I don't see how the tragedy that was colonialism in any way justifies his actions.

    2. Re:30 years ago by Securityemo · · Score: 2

      It isn't political correctness per se, it's just that it's the thing keeping their mind off the harsh realities of the world. Of course, people who do face these "harsh realities" seems to often have other mental or emotional flaws.

      --
      Emotions! In your brain!
  10. Not news... by Oxford_Comma_Lover · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I fail to see how this is really news... Zimbabwe has a pretty bad human rights record, and stuff worse than this happens around the world all the time. A number of Universities have withdrawn honorary degrees given to Mugabe. The only difference here is the person whose rights were abused was a law professor.

    http://www.hrw.org/en/world-report-2011/zimbabwe (Human Rights Watch report on Zimbabwe).

    Still, the slashdot community tends to have only slightly more knowledge than the general public about human rights matters. So perhaps it's good to occasionally have such stories.

    --
    -- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
    1. Re:Not news... by FuckingNickName · · Score: 2

      How many people will the US government kill by gun, by bomb, by manipulating foreign regimes? How many in its own country will be left destitute or gratuitously incarcerated, unable to access good healthcare and with challenges far beyond most man's capabilities, because of an unequal law and unequal balance of power? How many vulnerable people will be will be denied the help they need because of some bureaucratic box-checker with a quota to achieve, then die because they can't afford the heating bill?

      Under Mugabe and Chavez, the method of torture is simple and honest: you beat or you crush or you cut to physically injure. In a modern state, the method of torture is to overwhelm with bureaucracy and to hoard readily available resources, so that people are left alone to wither away or to kill themselves.

      Give me Mugabe any day. Even if he kills me, I know that his method is not sustainable, and one day he will be old and everyone will be tired of him. The country will then yearn for and achieve freedom, and while still new will cherish the freedoms it has achieved. The West, on the other hand, has forgotten the difference between freedom and oppression, with insurmountable technology to monitor dissenters. Breaking out of our current death spiral will be much harder.

    2. Re:Not news... by FuckingNickName · · Score: 2

      Sorry, luv, wrong continent. Yes, access to healthcare for a 2 year old is, on the civilised side of the pond, considered "a human right". Recall that "right" is simply a label for some long-standing privilege regarded as universally applicable by common consensus. Recall also that consequent action/inaction is the result of human diplomacy and legislation, not any inherent natural property or gift from on high, regardless of what the (often very sensible) Founding Fathers said.

      You are welcome to put forward an argument that you, as an ill 2 year old, should have been helped to live because your parents could afford healthcare, whereas another ill 2 year old should be left to die because his parents could not afford healthcare. Proceed.

    3. Re:Not news... by Opportunist · · Score: 2

      You know what? You're right! Why bother with healthcare for little children where almost no investment has taken place that could be saved by healthcare? I think we should discover the break even point where the treatment costs balance against the general investment so far in a person (considering education and all), I would expect that around age 7 or 8 this BEP is reached, below that age healthcare is a waste of money.

      If you want to be capitalist, at least go all the way!

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  11. Re:This happens in more places than Zimbabwe alone by elashish14 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not to mention that they're also torturing Manning as we speak http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/12/14/manning.

    You're pretty uninformed.

    (Sorry for double post)

    --
    I have left slashdot and am now on Soylent News. FUCK YOU DICE.
  12. In Capitalist America ... by DrJimbo · · Score: 5, Funny

    In Capitalist America watching evening news tortures you!

    --
    We don't see the world as it is, we see it as we are.
    -- Anais Nin
  13. Re:This happens in more places than Zimbabwe alone by jelizondo · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So, maybe it doesn't happen today in Guatemala, but it does happen today in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo and perhaps other places we don't know about; because it stopped in Guatemala every thing is all right...

    According to your logic we should have let the Nazis off after the war because they were no longer torturing and killing people.

    No, no, no. Such people must be brought to justice and face the music for they crimes, if they were American or Guatemalan, it does't matter.

    --
    Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never, ever get it out. - Cardinal Wolsey
  14. Mugabe is a total idiot by judeancodersfront · · Score: 2

    The world has a hard time admitting this since Mugabe was supposed to lead the country away from evil white rule. He's not only a psycho thug but a total idiot when it comes to economics. He doesn't seem to get that printing money for government workers is bad in the long run and that inflation cannot be controlled through price fixing. It's like watching a freshmen who hasn't taken econ 101 run an economy. Milk is too expensive? Well then machete anyone who charges more than $2. Problem solved.
    Anti-white, pro-white, pro-black whatever I don't care just please admit this guy is one of the worst leaders Africa has come up with. Just awful.