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["DUCLAYAN, GINA" <GDUCLAYAN AT popcouncil.org>]

>identified only as Mr. T because of fears for his safety

Come on now, is anybody still intimidated by Mr. T?

-----Original Message-----
From: Mat Honan [mailto:mhonan AT earthlink.net]
Sent: Friday, November 03, 2000 2:25 PM
To: monkeywire
Subject: [monkeywire] Apartheid forces used baboon fetus to intimidate
Tutu, witness says


Hi Joe,

I'm not sure whether or not this works, as Carrie pointed out to me: "it's
not actually monkey news by our definition ("what monkeys DO, not what is
done to them..")"

But she said I still might run it by you.  So here it is.

-Mat
----------------------------------------------------------
AP Worldstream
November 3, 2000

Apartheid forces used baboon fetus to intimidate Tutu, witness says



PRETORIA, South Africa -- South Africa's apartheid-era security forces hung
a baboon fetus from a tree in the garden of Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu in
an effort to intimidate the outspoken critic of the white regime, a former
security agent told a court Friday.

''The idea was to frighten Tutu with witchcraft,'' said a former member of
the psychological warfare arm of the Civil Cooperation Bureau, an apartheid
military death squad.

The witness, identified only as Mr. T because of fears for his safety,
testified Friday in the trial of Dr. Wouter Basson, who is accused of
running the government's chemical and biological warfare program from the
mid-1980s until apartheid ended in 1994.

Basson, who has maintained his innocence, is charged with 11 counts of
conspiracy to commit murder.

Mr. T said his unit used anthropologists, sociologists and psychologists in
an effort to play with people's minds. The unit felt witchcraft was a useful
weapon in South Africa, where many people believe in the occult.

The unit also described the effort to intimidate Tutu as a success, claiming
he stayed out of the public eye for several weeks after the fetus was placed
on his property.

Tutu, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, said in a statement he was not
intimidated by the baboon fetus, and, in fact, he did not even know about it
until authorities later informed him. His gardener had buried the fetus
without telling him, he said.

Mr. T said he had also played a role in a plot to kill Dullah Omar, who is
now the transport minister, by tampering with his heart medication.

Earlier in the trial, CCB operative Slang van Zyl testified that there had
been plans to either shoot Omar or tamper with his heart medication, but the
plans were never carried out.

In a statement given to the court Friday, Omar said he was unaware of an
attempt on his life at the time.

On Monday, the Rev. Frank Chikane, now a top aide to President Thabo Mbeki,
testified of several near-death experiences he suffered after the security
forces tried to kill him by poisoning his clothes.


 


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