From Socialist Worker http://socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=27927

The conviction of six socialists in Zimbabwe on trumped-up charges highlights the brutality of Robert Mugabe’s regime, writes Ken Olende

A magistrate in Zimbabwe convicted six socialists of “inciting public violence” on Monday. The six had watched a video of news footage from the uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia.

Some 160 supporters in the public gallery showed their outrage. Riot police were positioned outside to control hundreds more demonstrating there. The verdict shocked protesters as the state’s case had looked as if it was collapsing due to lack of evidence.

One of the defendants, Munyaradzi Gwisai, said after the verdict, “The judiciary is being used by the regime to persecute and intimidate the opposition and civic society, to keep them confined by court cases that drag on, even if there is no case against them.”

Munyaradzi is general coordinator of the International Socialist Organisation (ISO), the Socialist Workers Party’s sister ...