Zimbabwean riot police beat a group of unarmed protestors Wednesday and detained a number of union leaders in the latest in a series of protests over crippling cash withdrawal limits that have rattled Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe's regime.

The police used batons to beat back a group of around 50 protestors that attempted to march on the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe in central Harare to demand an end to cash restrictions.

The demonstrators, who were answering a call for protests by the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), carried placards reading "No to cash limits" and "We are tired of sleeping at the banks."

Shortly after, police attacked another demonstration next to the city's main state hospital by doctors and nurses demanding better working conditions, including measures to stem a worsening cholera outbreak. In both incidents, dozens of demonstrators were rounded up and carted off in police trucks.

The death toll from the waterborne disease had risen by 81 in a single day to 565 dead and a total 12,546 cases, mostly in Harare, the United Nations in Geneva said Wednesday.

The outbreak has also spilled across the border into South Africa, where seven people have died from cholera in the border town of Musina, health authorities there told South African radio.

Of the 76 people taken into custody Wednesday were ZCTU secretary- general Wellington Chibebe and Raymond Majongwe, secretary-general of the outspoken Progressive Teacher's Union of Zimbabwe, a ZCTU spokesman said.

Defence Minister Sydney Sekeramayi has accused the ZCTU of colluding with hundreds of disgruntled army officers, who ran amok through the streets of Harare Monday, apparently in frustration at having to queue for hours at cash machines.

Sekeramayi vowed that the "rogue soldiers" who looted shops and attacked black market currency dealers before being subdued by police would be apprehended and "brought to justice."

Nine-figure inflation has made cash extremely short in Zimbabwe and led banks to impose unrealistically low maximum withdrawal limits.

The limit has just been increased to 100 million Zimbabwe dollars (about 50 US dollars) a week, from 500,000 Zimbabwe dollars (about 25 US cents).

Also Wednesday, the central bank announced the issue of new 100- million-Zimbabwe-dollar bank notes, only four months after it slashed 10 zeroes off the previous set of denominations.

Elsewhere Wednesday, the director of an organization that promotes peace was taken from her home in the early hours of the morning by unidentified armed men that activists believe were intelligence agents.

Jestina Mukoko, the Director of the Zimbabwe Peace Project was whisked away in a car with no registration plates, the Institute for Justice & Reconciliation in Cape Town reported. Her whereabouts are unknown.

Her disappearance follows the detention by police around a month ago of 15 opposition supporters, with a 2-month-old baby among the group.

Despite a High Court order demanding the group be brought before a court and charged or released, their whereabouts is also unknown.