Mozambique: Attorney general says 60 ‘terrorists’ in prison in 2019 – Watch

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Mozambique: Attorney general says 60 ‘terrorists’ in prison in 2019 – Watch

5:29 CAT | 20 May 2020

Photo: Miramar

Mozambique’s Attorney General Beatriz Buchili said in parliament on Wednesday that 60 defendants were remanded in custody in 2019 accused of involvement in armed attacks in northern Cabo Delgado province.

Beatriz Buchili disclosed the data in the annual information from the Attorney General’s Office which she gave today in parliament.

“In the period under review [2019], we registered 28 cases, with a total of 60 defendants in pre-trial detention,” she said.

In 2018, 19 cases had been opened in relation to armed attacks in Cabo Delgado province.

Fifty of the defendants who were remanded in custody in 2019 are Mozambicans, six are from Tanzania, two are from Somalia and the same number are from Kenya.

In the same period, 23 indictments were filed in 23 cases and five cases are under preliminary investigation.

Beatriz Buchili did not refer to the outcome of the cases opened, in particular the number convicted or acquitted.

Also on the armed violence in Cabo Delgado, the Prosecutor General considered it urgent that the National Criminal Investigation Service (Sernic) be provided with sophisticated equipment and technical-operational expertise commensurate with the level of crime in the province.

Cabo Delgado, a region where megaprojects for the extraction of natural gas are advancing, is facing attacks from armed groups classified as a terrorist threat and which have caused the death of at least 550 people in two and a half years.

The Mozambican authorities say 162,000 people have been affected by armed violence in the province.

Source: Lusa / Media Mais Tv