HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — A court has ordered militant supporters of President
Robert Mugabe to stop exhuming hundreds of skeletons they say were the victims of colonial-era massacres, a project that critics say is stoking racial hatred in Zimbabwe.
The
High Court in Bulawayo ruled that the group must immediately cease digging out human remains from a disused mine shaft where officials have bused schoolchildren to view the remains as militants denounced whites and sang revolutionary songs.
Thursday's ruling by Judge
Nicholas Mathonsi says some surviving former guerrillas from the independence war had demanded a halt to exhumations that were not being carried out by experts. Government ministers in charge of police and security must enforce the order, he said.
The judge said the exhumations violated all international protocols on investigating suspected human rights violations and amounted to "interference or tampering with crime scenes."
In this March 18, 2011, photo, a body lies about 40 metres below the surface at Monkey William Mine about 200 km from Harare. Hundreds of skeletons found at one of the mine shafts have brought a macabre thrust to election campaigning in Zimbabwe, but the putrefying stench of some corpses still with skin, hair and dripping body fluids has raised doubts over claims white colonial era troops committed the massacres more than thirty years ago. A court in Zimbabwe Thursday, April 7, 2011, ordered militant supporters of President Robert Mugabe to stop exhuming hundreds of skeletons they say were the victims of colonial era massacres. Photo: Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi / AP
n this March 18, 2011 photo, a woman who people claimed is possessed by the spirit of the dead, goes into a trance at Monkey William Mine about 200 km from Harare. Hundreds of skeletons found at one of the mine shafts have brought a macabre thrust to election campaigning in Zimbabwe, but the putrefying stench of some corpses still with skin, hair and dripping body fluids has raised doubts over claims white colonial era troops committed the massacres more than thirty years ago. A court in Zimbabwe Thursday, April 7, 2011, ordered militant supporters of President Robert Mugabe to stop exhuming hundreds of skeletons they say were the victims of colonial era massacres. Photo: Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi / AP
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