Raid on aircraft follows kidnappings

Press, 27 July 1982, Page 1

Raid on aircraft follows kidnappings

NZPA Harare The Zimbabwe Government faced a deteriorating security situation yesterday after two big week-end attacks. • Saboteurs struck the country’s top air base yesterday and put out of action a large part of Zimbabwe’s Air Force. Less than 48 hours earlier, gunmen abducted six foreign tourists — two Americans, two Britons, and two Australians — and said they would kill them within a week unless certain political demands were met. The safari tour driver, Mr Bruce Watkins, of New Zea-

land, was released with a handwritten note stating dissidents’ demands. The Prime Minister (Mr Robert Mugabe) has given no sign of how his Government will react to the blows to its armed forces and the tourist industry, a vital earner of foreign exchange. The attack on the Thornhill base outside the midlands city of Gweru (formerly Gwelo) was probably the most serious single attack against the Government since it took office in April. 1980. Government sources said they believed that 13 aircraft

had been hit, including the Air Force's latest jet trainers, four Hawk jets, worth $46 million, which arrived from Britain only 10 days ago. Local residents said damage appeared to be serious. They reported a series of pre-dawn explosions over about 45 minutes, accompanied by flames leaping from hangars. According to unofficial counts Zimbabwe’s Air Force has about 50 combat aircraft. No-one claimed responsibility for the attack, but it appeared certain that the Government would first look towards South Africa and

towards the opposition Z.A.P.U. party of Mr Joshua Nkomo. Zimbabwe and its black neighbours have frequently accused South Africa of sabotage and destabilisation. Hundreds of white Rhodesian military personnel fled south two years ago after the civil war which resulted in black majority rule, taking with them intimate knowledge of security installations. The Government blamed South African agents for blowing up $4O million worth of munitions at the Inkomo Barracks, near Harare (formerly Salisbury), last August:

Thornhill also lies on the northern edge of Matabeleland Province, the heartland of Mr Nkomo’s political support. Mr Nkomo’s former Rhodesian war guerrillas have been officially blamed for an anti-Government campaign in the region which has claimed at least 30 lives in the past five months. Mr dismissed Mr Nkomo from his coalition cabinet in February amid allegations of plotting a coup and has accused Z.A.P.U. of a gun attack on the gates of his Harare home last month. Mr Nkomo has appealed to the gunmen to release the

kidnapped tourists. He has denied any connection with the rising violence. Troops and police yesterday were still trying to track the hostages over large areas of wild bush. One official said yesterday that the searchers expected to confront the band soon. “We slept in the same area they did last night,’’ he said. A dawn-to-dusk curfew was imposed in the region as the paratroops, police with tracker dogs, armoured personnel carriers and spotter aircraft combed the area. Curfew violators risked being shot on sight.