MUGABE'S WIFE HANDS PHOTOGRAPHER BEATDOWN: Zimbabwe's First Lady reportedly 'flew into a rage.'

      *A British photographer said Sunday he had been beaten up and punched repeatedly by the wife of Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe as he was trying to snap photos of her in Hong Kong, reports AFP.

       Grace Mugabe, 43, flew into a rage when she saw photographer Richard Jones waiting outside as she left the five-star Kowloon Shangri-la Hotel with a female friend and a bodyguard in the southern Chinese city on Thursday.      

       Jones was about 20 feet away from Mugabe when she told her bodyguard to attack him, said Michael Sheridan, The Sunday Times correspondent who joined the photographer seconds after the assault.      

       "The bodyguard grabbed Mr. Jones, wrestled with him, attempted to take his camera. He then held him while Mrs. Mugabe struck him in the face repeatedly," Sheridan said.     

       "She was completely deranged, absolutely raging with anger," Jones, chief photographer of Hong Kong-based Sinopix photo agency, told AFP.      

       Jones said he went to see a doctor afterwards and was diagnosed as suffering from numerous bruises, cuts, and abrasions to his head and face.      

       "The cuts and bruises allegedly caused by the First Lady... were due to the diamond rings on her fingers," he said.      

       Three or four large African bodyguards appeared from the hotel and tried to approach Jones following the assault. But they were stopped by security officers at Tsim Sha Tsui Centre near the hotel, Sheridan said.Police were later called to the scene and took a statement from Jones.      

       The Sunday Times said Mugabe's trip to Hong Kong was part of a Far East holiday with her family. She had been in Singapore with her husband before flying to Hong Kong on January 9, the report said.