Amnesty International, Amnesty International Report 1996 - Mozambique, 1 January 1996, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6a9fe10.html [accessed 3 June 2023]
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The human rights situation was much improved over previous years. However, suspected government opponents were detained, often illegally, by police or soldiers and some were beaten in detention. There was a marked improvement in the human rights situation following the country's first multi-party elections in October 1994, won by President Joaquim Chissano's Frente para a Libertação de Moçambique (FRELIMO), Front for the Liberation of Mozambique. However, there were sporadic outbreaks of violence involving mutinous soldiers and the police. The UN Operation in Mozambique (ONUMOZ), which had been established following the 1992 General Peace Accord between the government and the Resistência Nacional Moçambicana (RENAMO), Mozambican National Resistance, was withdrawn at the end of March. The government faced opposition from RENAMO as it sought to assert authority over areas controlled by RENAMO during the conflict. In August the new National Assembly began to debate a bill to reintroduce compulsory military service. The bill included provisions for conscientious objectors and the debate had not concluded at the end of the year. There were riots in several prisons throughout the country as inmates protested against long delays in being brought to court, overcrowding and extremely harsh prison conditions. There were reports of arrests of RENAMO supporters but few details were available. Police and soldiers were reported to have detained people illegally and ill-treated them. For example, in February, two RENAMO members of parliament, Agostinho Murial and Jerónimo Malaguete, were detained by police in Muturara while they were visiting Tete province as part of a RENAMO delegation. They were beaten before being released without charge after several hours. The local police chief was subsequently suspended from duty and charged with illegal detention and beating, but he had not been tried by the end of the year. In another incident also in February, soldiers and military police stationed in Tete beat a group of civilians following an argument in a bar. In April Mário Serra, a teacher in Nacaroa, Nampula province, was detained for 24 hours, allegedly for denouncing irregularities and corruption in the local administration to the provincial governor when he visited the area. Mário Serra was beaten in detention. No action appeared to have been taken to investigate these incidents and to bring to justice those involved. One person was shot dead and eight people were injured in October when police opened fire during a demonstration in Maputo, the capital, in protest at the high cost of living. Police said that the man who was killed had been looting a shop and that they had shot him as he tried to flee. No judicial inquiry was apparently held to establish whether there had been excessive use of lethal force. Despite its election defeat in 1994, RENAMO continued to exercise effective control over some areas and to resist efforts to bring them under central government control. In such areas, government officials and supporters of the ruling FRELIMO party were sometimes subjected to abuses by RENAMO activists. For example, in June regulos (traditional chiefs) who supported RENAMO beat 12 police officers who attempted to open a police station at Dombe, Manica province, and forced them to leave. In October Rui Frank, a leading FRELIMO official in Gorongosa, Sofala province, was detained for two days by bodyguards employed by the RENAMO leader, Afonso Dhlakama, whom they accused Rui Frank of defaming. Some sources suggested that Afonso Dhlakama had ordered the detention of Rui Frank, but Amnesty International was unable to confirm this. In December Amnesty International wrote to the authorities to express concern about incidents of illegal detention and ill-treatment by the police and asked whether there had been inquiries with a view to bringing to justice those responsible for ill-treating detainees.
