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British journalists deported from Zimbabwe
Associated Press
April 15, 2005

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050415.wzimb0415/BNStory/International/

Harare — A judge acquitted two British journalists Friday of overstaying their visas and ordered them deported following their arrest while covering Zimbabwe's disputed March 31 parliamentary elections.

On Thursday, Sunday Telegraph reporters Toby Harnden and Julian Simmonds were acquitted of the more serious charge of working as journalists without accreditation, an offense that carries a two-year prison term.

They entered Zimbabwe on March 20 from Zambia and were given seven-day tourist visas. In his ruling Friday, Magistrate Never Diza said it was unclear whether Mr. Harnden and Mr. Simmonds were told when their visas expired, as no date was marked in their passports.

"The accused will get the benefit of the doubt," he said.

Mr. Harnden said they were looking forward to returning to Britain and seeing their families and "getting on with their lives."

"We feel very pleased that justice was done in the court today," he said in a telephone interview. "We have been declared 'prohibited persons' and we are going to get on the first possible flight out of the country."

President Robert Mugabe's government had held Mr. Harnden, 35, and Mr. Simmonds, 45, in jail until Wednesday under a special order prohibiting their release on bail. They were held first in police cells, then at a Harare prison.

Zimbabwe's Media Commission accredited more than 200 foreign-based journalists to cover the elections but said it refused 50 others because they or their news organizations were said to be hostile to Mr. Mugabe's government.

A Swedish journalist who took time out from covering the election to investigate the effects of Mr. Mugabe's seizure of 5,000 white-owned farms lost his accreditation and was deported.

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