TRC Final Report

Volume 6

Section 3

Chapter 1

Subsection 5

TYPES OF VIOLATIONS (MOST COMMON CATEGORIES )

Killings and attempted killings

36. Killings were by far the largest category of violation for which amnesty applications were received. However, the numbers need to be approached with caution. One soldier applied for a single incident that resulted in 624 killings, during the SADF raid on Kassinga in Southern Angola on 4 May 1978.^{1 8} Almost all of the remaining 265 relate to the killing of political activists, especially those believed to have had links with the ANC and Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK).

37 . In sharp contrast, most of the killings recorded in the human rights violations data are associated with public order policing or so-called ‘riot control ’.¹⁹ Only two amnesty applications were received in this category.

38. The number of attempted killings reflects those individuals targeted in failed operations as well as those injured ‘in the cross f i re’ where such information was specified. In many instances, however, no such detail was given and this figure is thus a significant under-count. For example, this figure does not include those present in a building or residence when it was attacked, unless they were named as having been injured.

39. Similarly, incidents involving ‘weapon modification’ are counted separately, unless deaths or injuries were specified or known of. ‘Weapon modification’ involved tampering with or modifying a weapon with the intention of making it lethal to the user, and thus constitutes attempted killing.

40. Forty-four of the applicants in the ‘killing’ category applied for amnesty for the mutilation and destruction of the bodies of their victims. The purpose of such mutilation was to disguise the fact that the victim had been killed. In some instances, bodies were completely destroyed by burning or the repeated use of explosives. In others, bodies were placed on limpet mines or landmines, which w e re then detonated in order to make it appear that the victim had blown himself up while laying them.

41. The eighty-three successful and four attempted cases of bombing and arson are counted separately. These include forty-eight attacks on homes using petrol bombs or other explosive devices, twenty-one cases of bombing of nonresidential buildings as well as several attacks on installations or government buildings. Only six of the eighty-four cases were arson attacks on vehicles.

42. It should be noted, however, that the statistics do not in any way represent the full extent of this practice. Members of a covert unit of the Northern Transvaal Security Branch applied for an unspecified number of attacks on activists’ homes using either petrol bombs or other more lethal explosive devices in several townships during 1986 and 1987. One applicant estimated that he was involved in between thirty and forty such attacks, another in as many as sixty.

Torture and assault

43. The Amnesty Committee received applications specifying only ninety cases of tort u re or assault. In addition, seventeen applications or investigations involved the use of torture and assault against an unspecified number of victims. A small number of applications involved torture in formal custody. These figures stand in sharp contrast to the 4792^{2 0} t o r t u re violations re corded in HRV statements.

44. These low figures may be partly explained by the fact that perpetrators seldom seem to have regarded torture as a major violation. Evidence of torture often emerged only during amnesty hearings and then as part of an amnesty application for an abduction or a killing, not as a human rights violation in its own right. Numerous applicants admitted that psychological and physical coercion was routinely used in both legal detentions and unlawful custody.

45. Further, although the Amnesty Committee received a number of applications for killings in unlawful custody, it received applications for only two of the fifty-nine known deaths in legal detention ²¹: those of Mr Steve Biko and Mr Stanza Bopape. In addition, several detainees ²² appear to have been formally released, but handed over to members of C1/Vlakplaas or other Security Branch operatives and killed.

Intimidation and disinformation

46. The majority of the ninety-one incidents in this category relate primarily to the so-called Stratcom activities of the Witwatersrand Security Branch. Acts of intimidation included harassing individuals by damaging their property; constant and obvious surveillance; making threatening phone calls, and firing shots at houses or throwing bricks through windows. Apart from one or two isolated incidents, no similar applications were received from regions outside of the Witwatersrand, despite the fact that such forms of intimidation were fairly routine elsewhere.

47. The twenty-five incidents involving discrediting or disinformation also relate mainly, though not exclusively, to Stratcom activities. These were not exclusively carried out by the Witwatersrand Security Branch.

Fomenting violence

48. Twenty-seven applications confirmed earlier suspicions about the state’s involvement in fomenting the violence and bloodshed that engulfed areas of South Africa in the 1990s. The Amnesty Committee heard evidence that support, arms and training were given to the IFP – mainly by Vlakplaas/C1 – and that support and arms were provided to the homelands in order to back attempted coups and promote destabilisation amongst the police and the military.

49. Six such incidents occurred during the 1980s and involved the provision of paramilitary capacity to the IFP (Operation Marion) and an attempt to set up an Inkatha-like organisation in the Eastern Cape/Ciskei/Transkei area (Operation Katz e n ) .