Tensions in Mozambique run high ahead of controversial inauguration – with at least 300 killed by police
Young men guard their barricades in the Casa Branca neighbourhood on the outskirts of Mozambique’s capital, Maputo.
They block off our van and one of them flashes a knife as we get down and try to convince them to speak to us. It is a state of frustration, rage and hyper-defence.
The escalating civil unrest began in October, after an election overshadowed by allegations of rigging against Mozambique‘s ruling party, Frente de Libertaco de Moçambique (FRELIMO), who were declared winners.
With the inauguration of FRELIMO’s presidential candidate Daniel Chapo now just a day away, tensions in the capital are running high – and the number of deaths due to the police crackdown on the protests has now topped 300.
As we talk to the men in Casa Branca, balaclava-wearing police officers in armoured vehicles and pick-up trucks close in. Live shots ring out and tear gas is directed at our small gathering.
We take cover as the young men run into their neighbourhood.
Two armed police officers wearing balaclavas
Armed police patrolled just metres away – and soon fired shots and tear gas
We come back to speak to them after calm returns. Trust has been built in the short moments of chaos and more people join from the neighbourhood inroads to air their grievances.
“Why are they firing at us while terrorists kill our people in Cabo Delgado?” yells one man waving a tear gas canister and citing the Islamic State insurgency ravaging northern Mozambique.
“How can you live in a poor country and buy properties in Dubai?!” shouts another.
“A coconut costs 100 metical! How can a coconut be 100? Mozambique grows coconuts!” says another.
The young men agreed to speak to us after the police stopped firing at them
An older woman joins the furore: “People were shot with live bullets. Right here where we are standing. They are not aiming upwards but right at the people.
“Who voted for them? Who voted for them to rule us? We didn’t vote for FRELIMO or Chapo. We voted for Venencio!”
The crowd soon starts yelling the name of one man: Venancio Mondlane. The pastor-turned-political commentator who ran for president in Mozambique’s October election after resigning as a member of parliament.
Mr Mondlane has just returned to Maputo after nearly three months in exile following threats to his life and the double murder of his lawyer and closest associate.
At a hotel in the capital, he tells us: “I heard the people say that now it is time to forget that kind of local level, local municipality elections. Now we want you to be the president of Mozambique.”
When he arrived at Maputo International Airport, he took a presidential oath on the Bible to the throngs of people who faced tear gas and rubber bullets to meet him on arrival.
“This is what people told me on social media and many of them when they see me,” he says. “I was praying on this and I received the answer. The divine answer was: it is time, you must go. And then I begin this and run as a candidate for the elections.”
After rallying people across the country, Mozambique’s National Electoral Commission (CNE) declared victory for Daniel Chapo with 70% of the vote.
Daniel Chapo’s inauguration is scheduled to take place on Wednesday
Mr Chapo was the presidential candidate and secretary-general of FRELIMO – the founding party of modern Mozambique that liberated its people from three centuries of Portuguese colonial rule in 1975 and held power for the 50 years that followed.
In recent years, FRELIMO’s liberation-era generals and ministers have been accused of fraud and corruption – most notably, a $2bn secret US loan scandal.
“With the mercy of God, they would only get like 10%. The high mercy of God,” Mr Mondlane says, pointing to the sky.
“That is why they are killing people. They are shooting people. During the election, they arrested our party monitors that were key to monitoring the polls.”
A man allegedly injured by a gunshot wound – fired by police – receives treatment in the city of Matola
Local and international independent observers have cited irregularities in the voting process and a lack of transparency in declaring results.
The 179-person European Union Election Observer mission noted “irregularities during the counting and unjustified alteration of election results at the polling station and district level”.
Mr Mondlane called for three days of national strike and protest in the lead-up to Mr Chapo’s presidential inauguration. If not to take power now, then at least to make a point.
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Venancio Mondlane recently ended a three-month self-imposed exile
“The best situation – the most comfortable – is to take power now. But we know that is not automatic,” he explains. “Some things are a process – resistance is a process.
“Yes, it is symbolic but it is also practical because when you have an inauguration one of the things that have an impact is the number of crowds.
“If you have got something like 90% of people protesting and 10% of people at the inauguration, then this has political meaning – even to the international community.”
The streets in central Maputo were eerily silent as MPs were sworn in on Monday. Armoured vehicles, the military and the police were widely deployed.
The main room of the Assembly of the Republic was buzzing with Mozambique’s ruling elite. Two half-rows of empty chairs were a loud reminder of the boycott fuelled by Mr Mondlane.
As the day wore on, reports emerged of protesters shot in the next city, Matola.
At Matola’s main hospital, we see men who say they were in the area when the police started firing. In a single ward, one man had a gunshot wound shot in his crotch, another in his forearm arm and one in his leg.
Even as he writhes in pain from a bullet hole in his leg, Arone tells me that time is up.
“I want a change,” he says. “This government don’t make well for our people.”
A man lays injured at a hospital in Matola
In the upper balcony of the Assembly of the Republic, I ask President-elect Daniel Chapo what he has to say to Mozambicans whose loved ones were killed in the run-up to his presidency, to protect FRELIMO’s grip on power.
“Firstly, it is very important to be in power – after the inauguration – and then it is important to work with all people in Mozambique to develop our country,” says Mr Chapo.
Will there be any accountability for the 300 people who were killed?
“Yes, we are working now with it. We know it is not good and we want to talk to people. It is good to be in peace and develop our country.”
“Follow me and be careful,” says the commander, as he leads us down a narrow path in the dead of night.
The overgrown tract had once been occupied by the Russians, and there are landmines scattered on the side of the path.
But the men with us are more concerned about the threat from above.
Members of a unit in Ukraine’s 3rd Assault Brigade, they run a covert operation from an underground cellar, tucked behind a ruined farmhouse.
And what they are doing in this old vegetable store is pushing the boundaries of war.
“This is the interceptor called Sting,” says the commander, named Betsik, holding up a cylindrical device with four propellers.
“It’s an FPV [first-person view] quad, it’s very fast, it can go up to 280km. There’s 600 grams of explosive packed in the cap.”
The Sting interceptor drone used by the Ukrainians
However, he had not told us the most important thing about this bulbous drone.
“It can easily destroy a Shahed,” he says with determination.
Devastating and indiscriminate drone attacks
Once viewed as a low-cost curiosity, the Iranian-designed Shahed drone has turned into a collective menace.
As Russia’s principal long-range attack weapon, enemy forces have fired 44,228 Shaheds into Ukraine this year, with production expected to rise to 6,000 per month by early next year.
A Shahed-136 drone used by Russia amid its attack on Ukraine, on display in London. Pic: Reuters
The Russians are also changing the way they use them, launching vast, coordinated waves at individual cities.
The damage can be devastating and indiscriminate. This year, more 460 civilians have been killed by these so-called kamikaze weapons.
Russia’s strategy is straightforward. By firing hundreds of Shaheds on a single night, they aim to overload Ukraine’s air defences.
It is something Betsik reluctantly accepts.
Betsik observes the work of the team on in the cellar
Still, his unit has come up with a groundbreaking way to tackle it.
Perched in the centre of the vegetable store, we watch a youthful drone pilot and a couple of navigators staring at a bank of screens.
“Guys, there’s a Shahed 10km away from us. Can we fly there?” asks one of the navigators, called Kombucha.
He had just spotted a Shahed on the radar, but the enemy projectile was just out of reach.
“Well, actually 18 km – it’s too far,” Kombucha says.
“Do you know where it is going?” I ask.
“Yes, Izyum, the city. Flying over Izyum, I hope it won’t hit the city itself.”
Kombucha takes a deep breath.
“It is driving me nuts when you can see it moving, but you can’t do anything about it.”
The chase
The atmosphere soon changes.
“Let’s go. Help me lift the antenna.”
An engineer runs an interceptor drone up to the unit’s ad-hoc launch pad, located on a pile of flattened brick.
“The bomb is armed.”
The drone pilot, called Ptaha, tightens his grip on the controller and launches the Sting into the night sky.
Now, they hunt the Shahed down.
Their radar screen gives them an idea of where to look – but not a precise location.
“Target dropped altitude.”
“How much?”
“360 metres. You’re at 700.”
Instead, they analyse images produced by the interceptor’s thermal camera. The heat from the Shahed’s engine should generate a white spec, or dot, on the horizon. Still, it is never easy to find.
“Zoom out. Zoom out,” mutters Ptaha.
Then, a navigator code-named Magic thrusts his arm at the right-hand corner of the screen.
“There, there, there, b****!”
“I see it,” replies Ptaha.
The pilot manoeuvres the interceptor behind the Russian drone and works to decrease the distance between the two.
The chase is on. We watch as he steers the interceptor into the back of Shahed.
“We hit it,” he shouts.
“Did you detonate?”
“That was a Shahed, that was a Shahed, not a Gerbera.”
Going in for the kill
The Russians have developed a family of drones based on the Shahed, including a decoy called the Gerbera, which is designed to overwhelm Ukrainian defences.
However, the 3rd Brigade tells us these Gerberas are now routinely packed with explosives.
“I can see you’ve developed a particular technique to take them all down,” I suggest to Ptaha. “You circle around and try to catch them from behind?”
“Yes, because if you fly towards it head-on, due to the fact that the speed of the Shahed…”
The pilot breaks off.
“Guys, target 204 here.”
It’s clear that a major Russian bombardment is under way.
“About five to six km,” shouts Magic.
With another target to chase, the unit fires an interceptor into the sky.
Ptaha stares at the interceptor’s thermal camera screen.
The lives of countless Ukrainians depend on this 21-year-old.
“There, I see it. I see it. I see it.”
The team pursues their target before Ptaha goes in for the kill.
“There’s going to be a boom!” says Magic excitedly.
“Closing in.”
On the monitor, the live feed from the drone is replaced by a sea of fuzzy grey.
“Hit confirmed.”
“Motherf*****!”
‘In a few months it will be possible to destroy most of them’
The Russians would launch more than 500 drones that night.
Betsik and his men destroyed five with their Sting interceptors and the commander seemed thrilled with the result.
“I’d rate it five out of five. Nice. Five launches, five targets destroyed. One hundred percent efficiency. I like that.”
Maxim Zaychenko
Nevertheless, 71 long-range projectiles managed to slip through Ukraine’s air defences, despite efforts made to stop them.
The head of the air defence section in 3rd Brigade, Maxim Zaychenko, told us lessons were being learnt in this underground cellar that would have to be shared with the entire Ukrainian army.
“As the number of Shaheds has increased we’ve set ourselves the task of forming combat crews and acquiring the capabilities to intercept them… it’s a question of scaling combat crews with the right personnel and equipment along the whole contact line.”
Betsik speaks to Sky News
Buoyed by the night’s successes, Betsik was optimistic.
“In a few months, like three to five, it will be possible to destroy most of them,” he said.
“You really think that?” I replied.
“This is the future, I am not dreaming about it, I know it will be.”
Photography by Katy Scholes.
Thousands who fled a key frontline city in Sudan’s war as it fell to paramilitaries were targeted in killing fields around it by the group, after the military’s top brass secured their own safe passage.
Warning: Some readers may find content in this article distressing.
More than 60,000 people are still missing and humanitarians fear that Al Fashir’s remaining 200,000 residents are being held hostage by Rapid Support Forces (RSF) fighters.
In our investigation with Sudan War Monitor and Lighthouse Reports, we can reveal the harrowing fate of civilians and soldiers who fled the city in the hours after senior commanders and officers left the infantry division.
Some 70,000 people have escaped Al Fashir since it was captured on 26 October, according to the DTM matrix of the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), but fewer than 10,000 people are accounted for in the nearest safe displacement zones.
In an effort to track down the missing, we analysed dozens of videos and followed crowds of civilians on their way out.
In this first video, we see a group, and two men – the first with a yellow hoodie and black jacket walking beside a dirt berm along with women and children.
An image from the first video
In a later video, we see a crowd of captives that includes the two men – in the same yellow hoodie and red turban.
A video of men sitting on the ground under RSF armed guard shows the women walking through freely, showing they had been separated.
An image from the second video
In another video, we see the man in a red turban in a queue of men who start to run as RSF fighters chase and beat them.
An image from the third video
A source on the ground told us that this single group had around 2,000 captives and only 200 of them arrived at the nearest displacement shelter in Tawila, around 45 miles from Al Fashir.
We geolocated one of the videos of the group walking approximately 5km (three miles) from the nearby town of Geurnei.
We geolocated one of the videos of the group walking three miles from the nearby town of Geurnei. Pic: Copernicus
There, hundreds were rounded up in school buildings.
‘They would execute people in front of us’
The families of doctors held there told Sky News the RSF asked them to pay ransoms to secure their release.
A man who survived captivity in Geurnei with his wife told us he was held with around 300-400 families after being robbed and harassed on his way out of Al Fashir.
“We got to the school and they caught up with us. They starting targeting people – elderly and young – and took them to be detained,” said Abdelhamid.
“They would select people and execute them in front of us and then say – ‘bury your brother’ – and we would cover them with soil. I saw them kill 18 people with my own eyes and then people had to bury them with their bare hands.”
Satellite images from 30 October show mounds of dirt that appear to be new graves added to an existing cemetery, near school buildings in Geurnei.
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Others were executed in the fields outside of Al Fashir.
In a video shared on social media, a vehicle is shown pursuing civilians in the countryside.
The driver films as two fighters, one in an RSF patch, stop an unarmed man.
One asks what the man is carrying, and shoots him at point-blank range.
The car continues forward, accelerating towards and narrowly avoiding two unarmed men.
He asks one man if he is carrying anything and says he is “acting as if you are Arab”.
After the driver says “kill them all”, the camera turns back to the man, who appears to have been shot.
The driver then urges those with him to hurry to catch up with those ahead.
This brutality comes after the RSF encircled, starved and shelled Al Fashir for 18 months in their battle with the military for the last regional capital in Darfur under state control.
Several high-level sources told us that top state commanders, officers and political leaders made arrangements for their own safe passage in over 100 vehicles, including some armoured cars, before the 6th infantry division was captured by the RSF in the morning hours of 26 October.
The battle for Al Fashir – and Sudan
Earlier this year, Al Fashir was being suffocated to death by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) as they pushed to claim full control of the Darfur region as a base for their parallel government, after the military recaptured the capital Khartoum and other key sites in central Sudan.
On Monday, famine conditions were confirmed in Al Fashir and Kadugli, another besieged city in Sudan’s south, by the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).
Inside Al Fashir, thousands were bombarded by almost daily shelling from surrounding RSF troops.
The RSF physically reinforced their siege with a berm – a raised earth mound. First spotted by Yale Humanitarian Research Lab, the berm is visible from space.
The Sudan war started in April 2023, when long-simmering tensions between the Sudanese army and the RSF broke out in Khartoum.
The US special envoy to Sudan estimates that 150,000 have been killed, but the exact figure is unknown. Close to 12 million people have been displaced.
After 18 months of surviving forced starvation and shelling, the regional capital and symbolic battleground of Al Fashir fell to the RSF at the end of October.
What does the head of the SAF say?
The commander in chief of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) Abdel Fattah Al Burhan has said the withdrawal was to spare the city from further destruction, indiscriminate shelling and drone attacks.
In response to our findings, he told Sky News: “The decision to withdraw was unanimous among the armed forces, regular forces, and the joint security committee.
“The withdrawal began with an attack by drones on forces blocking one of the crossings, destroying their positions.
“Later, the forces fought until they broke through the barrier and moved to a location outside the city.
“During the withdrawal, the forces lost more than 300 martyrs, and most of their vehicles were destroyed. They remain besieged.
“They did not leave soldiers behind. Those who remained were tasked with securing the withdrawal, and they performed their duty as required.”
But instead of a co-ordinated withdrawal, a soldier left behind describes an abandoned command.
‘They completely abandoned us’
“The division commander had left the garrison. They completely abandoned us and we were suddenly surrounded 26 to 1 in the morning hours. Suddenly, everything collapsed on us in the defence. We asked what was going on and were told everyone fled,” he said.
“Shortly after, bombs started falling on us. Brigadier General Adam, the artillery commander, refused to withdraw, saying that the division commander had already withdrawn without informing him of the order. The brigadier general, six colonels, and a naval colonel were also captured.”
Testimony from a civilian who fled that morning paints a picture of chaos.
He said: “There was no co-ordination over withdrawal, and it seemed to be a surprise to the remaining fighters on the frontline. Some were leaving the city and others were fighting battles with the RSF.”
As the RSF entered Al Fashir, he told us civilians were massacred.
“The streets were covered in bodies. I saw it for myself. The RSF came into the city and butchered everyone they found. They did not discern between a child, a civilian or the elderly – they executed everyone, a full genocide.”
High-resolution satellite imagery captured by Vantor shows burnt vehicles grouped together south of the berm the RSF built to besiege Al Fashir.
A video we located at the site shows dozens of bodies, in fatigues and civilian clothing, lying lifeless on the ground by burning cars.
Mounting concern over 200,000 people
Fears are mounting over the fate of around 200,000 people left in Al Fashir.
A top RSF commander with knowledge of the operations in the city told us that at least 7,000 people have been killed in Al Fashir in the first five days of capture.
He said RSF fighters systemically targeted civilians from non-Arab tribes and killed groups of 300 to 400 people in some areas. Civilian sources close to the RSF corroborated his death toll, which we cannot independently verify on the ground.
Al Fashir is in a complete telecommunications blackout.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) in Sudan has shared in a post on X that their “Humanitarian partners in Sudan are being blocked from reaching A Fashir, North Darfur.
“Civilians are trapped inside, their condition unknown. Aid workers are ready to deliver life-saving support. Access needs to be granted now, in line with international humanitarian law.”
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The RSF has circulated videos on its social media channels showing trucks delivering aid to Al Fashir’s emaciated civilians.
This comes after months of volunteers and aid workers being killed by RSF fighters while trying to bring in relief during their 18-month siege of enforced starvation and relentless shelling.
What does the RSF say?
The spokesperson for the RSF’s political administration TASIS, Dr Alaa Nugud, told Sky News that the RSF there is a big fake media campaign prepared for the “Al Fashir liberation” and denounced the death toll of at least 7,000, shared by one of their top commanders, as “totally rubbish”.
In response to our report, he said: “Never happened that TASIS forces or any of its constituents killed civilians based on ethnic background, on the other hand this is what was done by SAF and the Muslim brotherhood National Congress Party doctrine during their 39 years of rule.
“SAF’s military intelligence was igniting these ethnic clashes throughout years they used religion to flame war in south Sudan and used racism and ethnicity to ignite war in Darfur.”
He added that “RSF and TASIS forces evacuated more than 800,000 civilians outside Al Fashir”.
“Could they not provide or grant safe passage to civilians? The reality is that the insurance of the continuation of the war and spoiling of all peace platforms… the continuation of this war is the main cause of all atrocities.
“The atrocities are consequences of this war, not the cause of the war. So to stop all these atrocities we have to stop the war and this is not there in SAF agenda.”
The RSF is accused of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity across Sudan since the war started in April 2023.
The Biden administration accused the RSF of committing genocide in Darfur in 2024, two decades after the group was first accused of genocide in the region as the Janjaweed.
Our previous reporting on Sky News has supported allegations that the UAE militarily supports the RSF, though the country officially denies it.
Additional reporting by Mohamed Zakarea, Sam Doak, Annoa Abekah-Mensah, Aziz Al Nour, Julia Steers, Jack Sapoch, and Klaas van Dijken.
This story was a joint Sky News data and forensics investigation with Sudan War Monitor and Lighthouse Reports.
The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.
Israel’s former top military lawyer has been arrested after admitting leaking a video of soldiers allegedly abusing a Palestinian prisoner.
The growing scandal comes as Israel handed over the bodies of 45 Palestinians, according to health officials in Gaza.
An Israeli official said ex-military advocate Major General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi was taken into custody overnight on Sunday – just a few days after resigning from her post, reported the Associated Press news agency.
She was arrested when a search was carried out along the Tel Aviv beach after concerns for her safety were raised by her family, reported Israel’s Channel 12.
Former chief military prosecutor Colonel Matan Solomesh was also arrested overnight as part of the investigation into the leaked video, reported Israel’s Army Radio.
The leaked footage was aired last year purporting to show an incident involving soldiers and a Palestinian prisoner at the Sde Teiman detention facility in southern Israel.
Hamas said the work to return the bodies of Israeli hostages has been complicated by the devastation in Gaza. Pic: Reuters
The developments came as the bodies of the Palestinians were received at Nasser Hospital, in Gaza, on Monday morning, a Gaza health ministry spokesperson told the Associated Press.
The release of the bodies came a day after Israel said Hamas had handed over the remains of three Israeli troops taken hostage on 7 October 2023.
Israel said the troops were killed in the attack on southern Israel before their bodies were dragged by militants back to Gaza.
A Hamas statement said the remains were found on Sunday in a tunnel in southern Gaza.
The Red Cross drove the remains of three more hostages across Gaza to the Israeli army at the weekend. Pic: AP
The three troops have been identified as Captain Omer Neutra, an American-Israeli, Staff Sergeant Oz Daniel and Colonel Assaf Hamami, according to the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Since the ceasefire started on 10 October, Palestinian militants have released the remains of 20 hostages, with eight now remaining in Gaza.
Hamas has released one or two bodies every few days.
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Can ceasefire hold despite Israel’s ‘ferocious’ attacks?
Israel has demanded faster progress and, in some cases, has said the remains were not those of any hostage.
Hamas has said the work to return the bodies has been complicated by the widespread devastation in Gaza.
Israel has been releasing the remains of 15 Palestinians for each hostage returned.
Health officials in Gaza have struggled to identify bodies without access to DNA kits.
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Only 75 of the 225 Palestinian bodies returned since the ceasefire began have been identified, according to Gaza’s health ministry.
About 1,200 people were killed and 251 kidnapped in the Hamas terror attack that sparked the war two years ago.
Officials in Hamas-run Gaza say more than 68,600 Palestinians have died.
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