In December 1973, the GA mandated a COI to investigate reported massacres in Mozambique (A/RES/3114 (XXVIII)).1 The Resolution passed with 109 votes in favour and 4 against (the US, Spain, Portugal and South Africa) with 12 abstentions. It instructed the COI “to carry out an investigation of the reported atrocities, to gather information from all relevant sources, to solicit the cooperation and assistance of the national liberation movement and to report its findings to the GA as soon as possible” (ibid.). The resolution also requested the Government of Portugal “to cooperate with the Commission of Inquiry and to grant it all necessary facilities to enable it to carry out its mandate” (ibid., para. 3).2 The COI was composed of five Member States, Nepal (selected as Chair), Honduras, Madagascar, Norway and the German Democratic Republic. It published its report on 22 November 1974, and in it concluded that between 1971 and 1973, “personnel, for whose acts the Portuguese colonial Government is responsible, perpetrated a number of atrocities in Mozambique” (A/9621, p. 33). Further, the report ascribed “responsibility for acts of violence … to the repressive Portuguese Government”, which was overthrown on 25 April 1974 (ibid., p. 35). Finally, the report recommended “the Portuguese Government, the transitional Government of Mozambique and the future Government of independent Mozambique to take all measures necessary to bring to court all those persons responsible” (ibid., p. 36).
Notes
- The COI’s subsequent report in 1974 (A/9621) identified the massacres as having taken place in the Chiefdom of Gandali and the villages of Chawola, João and Wiriyamu in the municipality of Tete. ↩︎
- The 1974 Report of the COI on the reported massacres in Mozambique stated that the COI had not received such cooperation, “which would have allowed its members to hear witnesses in Mozambique and in Portugal”. ↩︎