Nearly 80 people apparently murdered by the Zimbabwean Army in its campaign to take control of a diamond field near the eastern city of Mutare are to be dumped in a mass grave.

A telephone call on Thursday from the top government official in the district to the city's deputy mayor is the firmest evidence yet of reported massacres in the Chiadzwa diamond fields in the past month.

Admire Mukovera, deputy mayor in Mutare - where the city council is controlled by the opposition MDC - said yesterday that the district administrator had called him to “ask for space for a mass grave for 78 people who were killed in Chiadzwa”. Mr Mukovera added: “He never mentioned who killed them [but] obviously it is the army and police because they are the only people allowed to go there. “He told me [the bodies] were in the mortuary but I don't know which one - there is nothing in the Mutare general hospital's mortuary.”

There have been widespread accounts of the killings from survivors emerging from the area, which has been sealed off with military roadblocks and troops. Those who live in the region say that anyone attempting to enter Chiadzwa is arrested and possibly tortured and killed.

Survivors have spoken of machinegun attacks by helicopter as well as police and army troops shooting at and setting dogs on civilians.

Police had tried repeatedly to drive off thousands of diggers and panners from the hot, arid landscape, but with little effect because so many officers were easily bribed with diamonds. Since the army was deployed last month, however, the area “is just about cleared”, Mr Mukovera said.

In his telephone call, the government official, named as Mr Mashava, also said allegedly that there are “another five people who died of cholera that they want to put in the mass grave”, according to Mr Mukovera.

Pishai Muchauraya, the MDC's district spokesman, said President Mugabe's regime was trying to hide its “murderous activities” by dumping its victims in mass graves. “The council must not give them ground until the facts and figures are made public and the circumstances of the murder of 78 people are known,” he said. Mr Mashava did not respond to attempts to contact him.

The diamond mine was the property of London-based Africa Consolidated Resources until the Government seized it last year and drove off the workforce. Shortly afterwards a Zanu (PF) official went on state television to urge ordinary people to go there and harvest the diamonds.

Tens of thousands descended on the area to dig for diamonds, which are not far below the surface. Late last year the Government decided to reassert control. In May reports emerged of appalling police brutality as they cleared people out.

Mr Mugabe's Government accused Britain, the former colonial power, of causing a genocidal cholera epidemic. “Cholera is a calculated racist attack on Zimbabwe by the former colonial power so that they can invade the country,” a spokesman said.

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