Zimbabwe crowd looks to US Embassy for help

CNN:

About 220 Zimbabweans congregated outside the U.S. Embassy in Harare on Thursday, seeking refuge from election-related violence, embassy spokesman Mark Weinberg said.

By evening, embassy officials were moving "most of the women and children into safe houses," and were exploring housing options for and distributing blankets to those who still hadn't been helped, Weinberg said.

Some of the refuge-seekers, identifying themselves as supporters of the opposition party Movement for Democratic Change, said militia members supporting President Robert Mugabe's party destroyed their homes or were hunting them because of their affiliation, according to a journalist at the scene.

CNN is not identifying the reporter for security reasons.

The journalist said the refuge-seekers, some holding their possessions, sat outside the building Thursday afternoon, waiting to be addressed by a U.S. Embassy official. A few of the people had bandaged wounds, according to the reporter.

"The people I can see right now look very miserable, dejected, confused," the reporter said. Watch the refuge-seekers wait outside the embassy »

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There is nothing like seeing real repression and torture to put the criticism of the Bush administration in perspective.If the US was really as bad as many on the left and in the terrorist rights movement suggest, these people would not be coming to the US Embassy for help.

They are coming because the US has condemned the Mugabe thugocracy for its abuse of its own people. They are coming because many of the African leaders have abandoned them to the abuse of the Mugabe regime. They are coming because the US is still the last best hope for their survival.