Zimbabwe Gets a Hero

Opposition leader becomes rallying cry after beating
By Heather McPherson,  Newser User
Posted Mar 15, 2007 1:46 PM CDT
Zimbabwe Gets a Hero
Morgan Tsvangirai Holds Press Conferecne    (Getty Images)

When Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe's police force brutally beat the leader of an opposition party, Morgan Tsvangirai, they might have unwittingly  created their own Nelson Mandela. Photographs of a battered Tsvangirai being led to a hospital in police custody Tuesday circulated around the globe, prompting impassioned cries of protest.

Galvanized by a recent announcement that the strongman's term will extend beyond 2008, his 28th year of rule, anti-Mugabe activists were meeting when Tsvangirai and nearly 50 other party members were arrested and flogged for, ironically, "inciting to violence," charges that were never brought formally. (More Zimbabwe stories.)

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