Zimbabwe

Opposition leader and presidential candidate Morgan Tsvangirai returned to his homeland Saturday, stopping first to visit hospitalized supporters who had been targeted in an onslaught of state-sponsored violence. He then called on autocratic President Robert Mugabe to "set his people free from poverty, hunger and fear" by stepping down. Tsvangirai, who had been out of Zimbabwe for six weeks after national elections, planned to return a week ago but decided against it after his party, the Movement for Democratic Change, said he was the target of a military assassination plot.

Zimbabwean authorities on Thursday twice detained opposition presidential candidate Morgan Tsvangirai and said a top official from his party would be charged with treason. Tsvangirai was released after two hours of detention in the town of Kwekwe but hours later was taken to a police station in Gweru, officials with his Movement for Democratic Change said. He was held late into the night and then released again.

U.S. officials will not take any action against a German firm that is providing key support to Zimbabwe's brutal regime and is also an important contractor to the American government, a Western diplomat said. The firm, Giesecke & Devrient, is printing trillions of Zimbabwe dollars that the government of President Robert Mugabe is using to try to prop up the country's collapsing economy, but also to pay off supporters and suppress its political opposition. U.S.

Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is considering whether to pull out of the June 27 presidential runoff election, fearing it will be a charade, a spokesman said Friday. A growing number of African nations, the United States and former colonial power Britain have said they do not believe the balloting will be free and fair because of violence that the opposition blames on President Robert Mugabe.

'Only God will remove me." With this public vow, Zimbabwe's strongman president, Robert Mugabe, officially ended the campaign for the presidential runoff election that is to be held on Friday. The campaign had already turned brutal, with Mugabe's thugs making nightly visits to opposition supporters, beating them, arresting them and forcing tens of thousands of people out of their homes. At least 85 opposition figures have reportedly been killed. Still, other African leaders -- notably Mugabe's chief enabler, South African President Thabo Mbeki -- looked the other way. But when Mugabe, who has ruled Zimbabwe for 28 years, announces that only God and not mere voters will remove him from office, why bother with an election?

Things have changed a lot in the land of the billion-dollar plastic shopping bag in the last couple of months. Before the March 29 presidential election, the biggest bank note was $50 million. Now, in the wake of opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai's decision to pull out of the runoff vote scheduled for Friday, there is a $50 billion bank note and one U.S. dollar buys more than 7 billion Zimbabwean dollars.

Zimbabwe opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai sought refuge in the Dutch Embassy here just hours after he pulled out of the presidential runoff election scheduled for Friday, citing rising violence by supporters of longtime President Robert Mugabe. Despite the opposition's withdrawal, the Zimbabwe ruling party's crackdown continued unabated Monday, with 60 opposition activists arrested by riot police in a lunchtime raid at the opposition headquarters.

At meetings across the nation, officials of Zimbabwe's ruling party have warned voters how they will know who casts ballots against longtime President Robert Mugabe in Friday's scheduled runoff election: serial numbers. The officials tell people that the ballot number will allow the ruling party to identify who has voted for the opposition so that they can be killed later, according to people who attended meetings in three neighborhoods around Harare, the capital.

The first time Andrew was forced to beat an opposition party supporter, he wanted to weep in sympathy. But it would have been suicidal to show pity on his victim in front of the ruling party youth militia leaders forcing him to commit the violence. "You feel like you want to cry, but you don't expose your tears," he said. "I feel pity beating someone, but there's nothing I can do."

With longtime incumbent Robert Mugabe continuing to campaign despite his opponent's withdrawal, Zimbabwean voters were warned of violent repercussions if they fail to vote in today's presidential runoff. Mugabe, campaigning in a lime-green jacket bearing the ruling ZANU-PF party logo, declared that Zimbabwe would not accept calls from African leaders or anyone else to postpone the vote.