Cape Town — Concerns about crime in the country among the diplomatic community have grown after Emmanuel Mwambulukutu, the outgoing Tanzanian high commissioner to South Africa, was badly beaten up and left unconscious at a farewell dinner held for him in Pretoria on Friday.

Mwambulukutu, a public servant for more than 10 years in the government of Julius Nyerere (the first president of Tanzania), was in a serious, but stable condition, in the intensive care unit at Pretoria East hospital.

His wife Lucy was stabbed in the head. She was treated and discharged.

The couple who had been in the country since 1999, were due to have returned home this week. They were being given a send-off by Tanzanian high commission colleagues.

About 40 guests - adults and children - were held up at gunpoint by a gang of four, some of them beaten up as the robbers went on the rampage.

"My daughter ran in to say there were criminals outside the house," said Themba Khumalo, a friend of the diplomat. "As I went to the door, I felt the barrel of a gun held to my head. I was asked to lie down on the floor," he said. When the diplomat told his attackers, "Gentlemen, God bless you", they replied, "We don't care for God. Let's stab these dogs."

Christopher Mlosy, who hosted the function, said he and his three children were also beaten up. "They just went around attacking guests as if we were dogs," he said.

Mlosy said the incident would tarnish South Africa's name within the diplomatic community. "There have been a number of attacks, but this seems to have been one of the worst.

"Most guests, with the exception of Khumalo, were Tanzanian. None of them now feel safe in South Africa and want to leave," he said.

South African Police Services spokesperson, Dennis Adriao, said police located the four suspects in Mamelodi West, but three escaped after the fourth suspect was wounded in a skirmish with police. At the scene police found weapons, stolen items and Mwambulukutu's vehicle.

Ronnie Mamoepa, spokesperson for Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, said she had expressed concern over the attacks. "We'll . . . do all we can to ensure state agencies get to the bottom of this."

Meanwhile, Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula said police were winning the fight against criminals targeting diplomats. Last month he beefed up security after reports that foreign diplomats are increasingly leaving their families behind when they are posted to South Africa because of the fear of crime.

French embassy defence attache Denis Fabre and his family were held up by armed robbers who looted their Sandton home. South Africa's ambassador to the United Nations, Dumisani Kumalo, was robbed at his son's home in Johannesburg in July.

In October, robbers shot Vietnamese embassy official Quochung Nguyen in the stomach in Pretoria.

In February, gangsters robbed six US embassy officials in Pretoria. Javed Khattak, the first secretary at the Pakistani high commission, had his home broken into. Nadir Khan Jadoon of the Pakistani high commission was attacked in his home, gunmen attacked a Greek defence official and envoys from Gabon and Madagascar had been held up.