political cases. This is a large number considering that police stations are supposed to be places of safety. There have been cases where people have gone to police stations to report cases and have ended up either assaulted or arrested. There were 35 cases of falanga, the majority of which took place at Harare Central Police station. The pattern in these cases seems to be that people are arrested, taken to different police stations, and then are often moved to Harare Central where they are usually detained and falanga frequently takes place. The most common weapons used for falanga are batons and wooden planks. In its report the Forum commented: Overall, this analysis does not support the claims of the government that it is being vilified by politically motivated groups using false claims of human rights violations, as there is clearly abundant evidence from the courts that state agents, both the police and the army, committed the ‘false’ gross human rights violations and torture on a massive scale. The data from the legal cases being mounted within the jurisdiction of the Zimbabwean courts themselves are the strongest evidence that the claims by the Zimbabwe government of false reporting are baseless. The legal cases wholly corroborate all the reports issued over the past years. Other reports alleging torture Apart from the reports from the Human Rights Forum that are analysed later, there have been a number of other reports from local and international organisations in which allegations of torture by police officers have been made. Both Amnesty International and the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims [IRCT] issued reports during 2000 and 2001 decrying the use of torture and mentioned a number of cases of torture involving the police.42 A number of local human rights organizations produced reports between 2000 and 2002, mainly concerned with the violations during the elections in 2000 and 2002. In these 42 See Amnesty International (2000), Zimbabwe: Terror tactics in the run-up to the parliamentary elections, June 2000, LONDON: AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL; Amnesty International (2002), Zimbabwe: The Toll of Impunity, LONDON: AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL; IRCT (2000), Organised Violence and Torture in Zimbabwe, 6th June 2000, Copenhagen and Harare, COPENHAGEN & HARARE: IRCT & AMANI TRUST; IRCT (2001) Organised Violence and Torture in Zimbabwe, 24th May 2001, Copenhagen and Harare, COPENHAGEN & HARARE: IRCT & AMANI TRUST. See also Physicians for Human Rights (2002), Zimbabwe 2002. The Presidential Election: 44 days to go. Physicians for Human Rights, Denmark, 24 January 2002.; Physicians for Human Rights (2002), Zimbabwe: Post Presidential Election – March to May 2002. “We���ll make them run”. Physicians for Human Rights, Denmark, 21 May 2002; Physicians for Human Rights (2002), Zimbabwe: Voting ZANU for Food: Rural District Council and Insiza Elections , Physicians for Human Rights, Denmark, August to October 2002. Who guards the guards? Violations by the Zimbabwe Republic Police, 2000 to 2006