Harare - A court in Zimbabwe Wednesday acquitted a U.S. and
a British journalist of covering the country's March 29 elections
without accreditation saying the state had failed to prove the
offence and ordered them to be released.
Magistrate Gloria Takundwa said the state's evidence against New
York Times correspondent Barry Bearak and Britain's Stephen Bevan, a
freelance journalist with the Sunday Telegraph, was 'inconsistent and
unreliable' and that the two should be released from remand.
Takundwa also reprimanded police for the 'unlawful detention' of
the two journalists after the Attorney-General's office had ordered
their release.
Bearak and Bevan were arrested on April 3 during a police raid on
a tourist lodge in Harare aimed at rooting out foreign journalists
who were covering the elections without accreditation.
The attorney-general found no case against the pair but police
initially refused to release them and brought new charges. The two
spent four nights in jail before being released on bail with
conditions.
Under Zimbabwe's draconian media laws working without official
accreditation is an offence carrying penalties of up to two years in
prison.
Only a handful of foreign journalists from 'friendly' countries
were given permission to cover the polls.
Commenting on the judgement the journalists' lawyer Beatrice
Mtetwa said: 'At least the magistrate court, unlike the judges, still
applies the law as it should be.'
'For this case and the other one (of two South African employees
of a satellite broadcasting company also charged and later acquitted
of working without accreditation) justice has prevailed.'
Bearak, who received medical treatment for a back injury sustained
during a fall in jail, declined an interview request. Bevan said
merely: 'I am very relieved.'
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