UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has condemned the beating of Kenyan ecologist Wangari Maathai, by security guards as they tried to replant trees at Karura Forest, near the Kenyan capital of Nairobi. The incident happened on Jan 8 when a group of protestors led by the ecologist, who sits on Annan's Advisory Board on Disarmament, were whipped and beaten in the forest, which is fast being encroached on by unidentified real estate developers, politicians and senior government officials.