Too late for free and fair elections - rights group

It's too late for free and fair presidential elections in Zimbabwe, but the deployment of international observers in remote areas could help stop politically motivated violence and torture, the human rights group Amani Trust told IRIN on Monday. President Robert Mugabe faces the biggest challenge to his two decades of rule when Zimbabweans go to the polls on the 9-10 March. However, the hotly contested election has been marred by political violence and intimidation by ruling ZANU-PF militants against supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) led by Morgan Tsvangirai. Frustrated by Harare's refusal to let its observers freely monitor the election, the European Union on Monday announced the withdrawal of its team and the imposition of "targeted sanctions" against the government. EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels said the "EU remains seriously concerned at political violence, serious violations of human rights and restrictions on the media ... which call into question the prospects for a free and fair election." The Amani Trust's Shari Epple, a clinical psychologist by profession, told IRIN that "free and fair went out the window two years ago" but that it was still critical that international observers be deployed in Zimbabwe's hotbeds of political intolerance, the rural areas. "They need to get out of Harare," Epple said of the few international observers who have been accredited so far by the Zimbabwe government. The Commonwealth and Southern African Development Community are among the organisation expected to send observers. Epple, co-author of a new hard-hitting report by Physicians for Human Rights on political violence and torture in Zimbabwe, warned: "The observers are not where they should be, which is in the remote rural areas where people are being tortured. As somebody who follows torture I would say we want observers, in the rural areas and NOW! "This election will still not be free and fair but observers could be a deterrent and stop the torture. There has been escalating violence (un-observed) but observers could document that, if they could get out of Harare! It could be a deterrent, people will not want to whip others with two metre long barbed wire if they thought the person could report what happened to an international observer." Epple and Dr Hans Draminsky Petersen, a founder of Physicians for Human Rights in Denmark, examined victims of torture, serious ill-treatment, murder attempts, and harassment in Zimbabwe. All the documented violence was allegedly committed by ZANU-PF supporters. Among the more serious accusations contained in their recent report is that of identity document (ID) theft. Said Epple: "To steal an ID is to steal the vote and it's pretty prevalent. It's deliberate and conscious political theft." Zimbabweans have to register to vote in the upcoming election. Without proof of their identity - an ID card - they will not be allowed to vote. "It's more or less a daily report now, people are asked for ID cards and ZANU-PF party membership cards, if you do not have the ZANU card they steal your ID," she said.