Assailants armed with semi-automatic weapons shot dead a white farmer and seriously wounded his son in continuing violence linked to disputed white-owned land, farmers leaders said today.

Henry Elsworth, in his 70s, was the seventh white farmer killed since ruling party militants illegally occupied hundreds of white-owned farms in February.

Militants had camped on Elsworth’s cattle ranch near Kwekwe, 200 kilometers (125 miles) southwest of Harare, for several months.

The Commercial Farmers Union said Elsworth and his son Ian were returning to their homestead around dusk yesterday when they were ambushed by gunmen at the farm gate.

Ian Elsworth, the driver of their vehicle, was shot five times in the lower body.

His father, wounded by one shot, “staggered to the driver’s side to attempt to start the car and was shot in the stomach.” He died 15 minutes later, the union said in a statement based on Ian’s account.

Ian Elsworth was in a stable condition in a Harare hospital Wednesday.

The union said the identity of the attackers and their motive was not known.

The union has blamed the killings on a break down in law and order in farming districts triggered by illegal farm occupations by ruling party militants and veterans of the bush war that ended white rule in 1980.

Three of the seven white farmers killed since February were outspoken supporters of the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

Elsworth was a former lawmaker in the white-dominated parliament of Rhodesia, as Zimbabwe was known before independence, and served as independent lawmaker among 20 seats reserved for whites for the first seven years of independence.

Elsworth had been an outspoken critic of President Robert Mugabe’s ruling party.

Mugabe has described the farm occupations as a justified protest against unfair land ownership by whites.

The government has ignored two High Court orders to end the illegal and often violent occupations as well as a Supreme Court ruling declaring land seizures illegal.

Earlier this month, Mugabe warned white farmers of expulsion if they continue contesting in court his plans to seize 3,000 white-owned farms and carve them up for landless blacks.

The Supreme Court ruled land seizures were not performed in accordance with legislation passed by Mugabe’s ruling party in April.

That legislation requires the government to evaluate the value of and pay for improvements, such as roads and irrigation, on land it seizes. Owners must also receive a three-months notice of seizure and be given time to vacate before blacks are resettled on confiscated properties.

About 4,000 white farmers own a third of Zimbabwe’s productive land, where about 2 million farm workers and their family members live. About 7.5 million live on the other two-thirds.

Zimbabwe is facing its worst economic crisis since independence in 1980. Farm occupations have cut production of tobacco and other export crops, and most foreign loans have been halted. Hard currency shortages have led to acute shortages of gasoline.