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Outrage greets brutality shown on South African police video

attack
This footage, shot in 1998, shows black prisoners beaten by white officers and attacked by police dogs during what was described by a training exercise in South Africa  

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa (Reuters) -- South Africa reacted with horror on Wednesday to a video aired on state television which showed police dogs repeatedly savaging black prisoners during what was described as a training exercise for the canine unit.

Karen Mckenzie, head of the Independent Complaints Directorate (ICD), a police watchdog, told reporters that dog units throughout South Africa would be investigated.

"It is imperative for us to look at dog units across the country," she said, adding that at least one of the four dogs on the tape was still in service. The dog would be re-evaluated to see if, among other things, it had been trained only to attack black people.

"Live Bait" screamed the headline in The Citizen newspaper over a photograph of a police dog tearing into a young black man as a police officer kicked him in the stomach.

"Racist Brutality" said the headline in the Sowetan newspaper, the country's largest black daily.

National Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi ordered the immediate arrest of the six officers early on Tuesday, after the state-owned South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) gave officials a private preview of what they planned to broadcast on Tuesday night.

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Selebi said in a statement that white officers who carried out racist acts six years after the end of white apartheid rule would be "flushed out and imprisoned."

The video of an incident in 1998 showed three unidentified black men, said by the SABC possibly to have been illegal immigrants, being driven to a field behind a gold mine dump.

There, for about an hour, they were repeatedly savaged by four dogs in what was billed as a dog-training exercise, while they screamed and begged for mercy.

The victims were beaten when they tried to fend off the dogs. They were kicked in the head and stomach while the dogs mauled their legs and arms.

Throughout the assault, the policemen laughed and cheered, with one telling the camera: "This is a training exercise."

The Johannesburg-based Star newspaper said it was inundated with calls from outraged viewers of the programme.

It quoted one black caller as saying: "We can't trust white policemen. We just can't trust them."

Parliamentary opposition leader Tony Leon said the footage "was horrifying and left a sense of shock among all reasonable South Africans. The scenes, although current, belong to the heyday of apartheid and have no place in the present South Africa."

Police spokeswoman Sally de Beer told Reuters the arrested officers would likely appear in court on Thursday on charges of attempted murder and assault.

"We are carrying out an investigation and if any other police officers are implicated they will be arrested," she said.

Analysts say that six years after the end of white-minority rule, police brutality and racism remain entrenched in some pockets of the police force.

Gareth Newham, a researcher with the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation, said: "There has not been enough done in the police since apartheid to change the values and attitudes which support brutality in the police."

He added that the country's high rate of violent crime contributed to a culture of violence in the police force.

More than 200 police officers are murdered each year.

According to the ICD, 681 people died in police custody or as a result of police action in South Africa between April 1999 and March 2000.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.



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