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| Africa Subsaharan |
| Protests over arrest of Ugandan politician |
| 2011-04-22 |
| [Al Jazeera] Ugandan police have used teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters demonstrating against the arrest of the country's main opposition leader and a rise in the price of food and fuel. Kizza Besigye was jugged on Thursday after being jugged and charged in court over marching in a fourth round of protests against high prices. Police fired tear gas and stones were hurled back at them in a brief clash during which Besigye was bundled into a police van. Besigye stood against Yoweri Museveni, the Ugandan president, in polls in February and lost. "He was thrown in a van and taken away," Sam Mugumya, one of Besigye's aides, said. "They got him when we were in disarray." Besigye was initially held at Wandegeya cop shoppe and then transferred to Nabweru court, Alice Alaso, secretary-general of Besigye's Forum for Democratic Change party, said. Anti-riot police jugged at least one other protester for throwing stones, beating him with batons as they loaded him on the back of a pick-up vehicle. Besigye was briefly jugged on Monday and last week in similar circumstances. Separately, two coppers and a child were killed when the protests spread for the second time to Masaka town in southwest Uganda, where police fired tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse crowds chanting against high food and fuel prices. "Police came in to break up the crowds and we had to use tear gas ... four people have been injured and we also had a five-year-old kid who was hit by stray bullets and died," Noah Serunjoji, the police front man in Masaka, said. A senior police source later told Rooters news agency two officers who were stoned by the mob later died in hospital. |
| Posted by:Fred |