Lawyers representing hundreds of people arrested at violent protests in Zimbabwe last week say it has become impossible to defend their clients due to state interference.
They are unable to secure bail for any of those charged in connection with last week's protests during a three-day stay away, and some dockets have allegedly been interfered with, according to several lawyers, exhausted by the never-ending number of detainees needing assistance.
Those arrested are presently held in filthy, decrepit, massively overcrowded police cells, without toilets and some need medical treatment while others have not been fed for days.
They were arrested after protests followed a sudden and unexpected massive rise in the price of fuel as bankrupt Zimbabwe does not have sufficient foreign cash to import sufficient fuel - about 160 million litres of petrol or diesel a month.
It came as the Zimbabwean Government said the crackdown on protesters, some of whom have died, is just a "foretaste" of things to come. President Emmerson Mnangagwa said he will return home and skip the World Economic Forum after the week of turmoil in which activists have said at least a dozen people have been killed in the crackdown.
