Cabo Delgado: Police to sue author of allegedly false report on torture

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Cabo Delgado: Police to sue author of allegedly false report on torture

3:28 CAT | 23 Jul 2020

Photo: DW

Police say they are going to sue a citizen who alleged on social media last week that 15 suspected insurgents were detained and tortured in northern Mozambique. Police say the allegations are untrue, and have started investigations.

The citizen in question accuses the Defence and Security Forces (FDS) of arresting and torturing 15 individuals allegedly planning an attack on the provincial capital, Pemba.

Cabo Delgado PRM spokesman Augusto Guta denies the allegation.

“Those responsible for transmitting the population’s level of security in the province are the Defence and Security Forces. Other sources, one must doubt. The primary source of transmission of security levels [is the police]. What we are saying here is that the situation is good, and that the [alleged] action is nothing more than misinformation,” he says.

President Filipe Nyusi issued a warning about disinformation more than a year ago, as well as urging the Defence and Security Forces to be disciplined in the way it deals with the population while combating insurgents in Cabo Delgado. The organisation Human Rights Watch had previously denounced abuses by the FDS.

Cd.gutaa_ — *Augusto Guta, police spokesman*

PRM version

Augusto Guta did however confirm that the authorities carried out an operation culminating in the arrest, on the coast of Pemba, of 13 people from Mocímboa da Praia. The detention, he said, was designed to ascertain the identity and motivations of the individuals, and was carried out without resorting to violence.

“A team made up of SISE [State Security and Information Service] and SERNIC [National Criminal Investigation Service] personnel carried out an investigation to establish whether these people actually belonged to the group creating insecurity in the northern area. They worked with the base structures in Mocímboa da Praia, our colleagues from the FDS, and the heads of the villages these individuals came from, and found that these individuals did not really belong to the terrorist group, but rather to the group of people that had left Mocímboa da Praia for the neighbouring province of Nampula in search of security for their families,” Guta said.

The individuals were then released, he added.

Process and accountability

The police say they have identified the author of the publication on social media, and say they will sue her to discourage further acts of disinformation.

“We are going to hold this citizen responsible for disseminating false information for the purposes of creating a climate of insecurity in Cabo Delgado,” Guta says.

“Whoever initiates actions of disinformation, whether an individual or an organisation, we will hold responsible, and the truth re-established,” he warns.

Source: Deutsche Welle