Harare — Zimbabwean police have raided churches in Bulawayo in a bid to remove thousands of people displaced by government's sweeping urban demolition blitz.

This was the second time the police hit religious buildings, after razing a mosque in the early phase of the blitz.

They raided from 9pm on Wednesday night until dawn yesterday, ferreting out refugees from the Presbyterian church in the city centre and the Baptist church and Agape ministries.

"The memory of a naked five-year-old child crying in the cold after being rudely awaken from her sleep by the riot police as they forced internally displaced people out of Agape Church in Nketa will always come back to haunt me," an Anglican priest said.

"I watched the riot police frogmarch her family into an open truck. Her mother struggled to load their wardrobe, probably one of the few valuable assets that survived the burning down of her shack in Killarney. Now the same people came back to force them out of the church to the transit camp," he said.

Standford Zulu, who was left homeless when his Tshabalala home was destroyed, said the police descended on the Agape ministries to flush out displaced persons living on the premises.

"They stormed the church buildings like soldiers raiding an enemy camp," Zulu said. "They threw out our few belongings, and told us to go away because stands have been made available for us to build at places like Cowdry Park."

The construction project at Cowdry Park is only at ground level because of lack of funds.

Aleck Phiri from Sizinda said the police were aggressive and hostile. "They harassed and sent women and children fleeing in terror," he said. "Right now we don't know where we will sleep."

He said some of the people who had been taken during the night were missing.

One witness said: "We watched in horror as the operation unfolded. People, including the sick and those on antiretroviral medication, the elderly and children who were already asleep, were woken up by the riot police and frogmarched into the open police trucks.

"People who had corrugated sheet, metal, timber and all that was left of their belongings were packed like sardines into trucks and driven off to unknown destinations."

Police arrested Baptist pastor Barnabas Nqindi yesterday for filming raids on his church.