Thread by @PerryAlexJ

Friends. I need your help to hold @TotalEnergies to account for their part in a hidden massacre of 1,357 people I have uncovered in Mozambique. Total's AGM is today (unless @amisdelaterre, @greenpeacefr, @attacfr et al succeed with #BlocageTotal), and it's time they listened.

Some context. @TotalEnergies is France’s biggest company. On the AGM agenda today: re-starting work at a natural gas plant Total is building in northern Mozambique, where work halted after 500 Islamists attacked the adjacent town of Palma on Mar 24, 2021.

The combined investment in gas extraction in Mozambique is projected to be $50 billion, making it the single biggest investment ever made in Africa. Total’s project accounts for $20 billion; a second one, led by ExxonMobil, accounts for $30 billion.

The risk? Palma and the 16,000-acre gas plant on the Afungi peninsula, south of town, are in an expanding war zone. The Islamist group of al-Shabab began its insurgency in 2017, affiliated to ISIS in 2019, and cut off Palma and Afungi from the rest of the country in 2020.

By March 2021, al-Shabab had taken 100s of miles of territory & its war with the state had cost 3,000 lives & displaced ¾ million. An attack on Afungi and Palma – already surrounded by the Islamists, and now a base for 100s of white construction contractors – seemed inevitable.

Don’t take my word for it. Anticipating problems, Total based itself inside a fortress at Afungi which, after al-Shabab advanced to its gates in Dec 2020, it reinforced with 600 Mozambican soldiers whom it hired to defend a wide cordon around Afungi, including the town of Palma.

Total boss @PPouyanne has often said that, under him, Total is a “responsible” oil and gas giant. Regards Mozambique, on Feb 20, 2021, he said: “My highest priority is security... We have a clear plan, securing an area of at least 25km around the project.” lngprime.com/africa/total-c…

A group of Canadian human rights lawyers hired by Total also stressed the escalating risk from the insurgency, and added that knowingly operating in a war zone came with heightened responsibilities for Total: mzlng.totalenergies.co.mz/en/system/file….

Crucially, the Canadians said Total’s moral and legal duty of care covered contractors, subcontractors and all “Project-affected communities” – that is, the entire town of Palma. Total also “ultimately has the lead role” when it came to protecting lives, the lawyers wrote.

I investigated the attack for 15 months, and wrote this account of it, focusing on 183 contractors, workers and civilians besieged at the Amarula Lodge, for @outsidemagazine. The piece won a George Polk award last month. outsideonline.com/outdoor-advent…

The story rounds on Total for abandoning its contractors and the people of Palma, despite its security promises and intelligence of an imminent attack. Total, an oil and gas giant, even denied aviation fuel to the lone rescue effort, by a private military company.

But there was a gap in my reporting. Because Palma’s population of 60,000 had fled, I couldn't reach them to ask what happened to people outside the Amarula. It wasn’t until summer 2022, after my story was out, that the population returned.

In September 2022, I went back to Palma to meet them. It was soon clear the loss of life was of a scale beyond my ability to assess alone. I heard about mass graves, a pit of 20 skulls, a dugout that sank with 50 people on board, and a base of 100 policemen wiped out.

A count of the dead was evidently of utmost importance. Without it, people couldn’t really say what had happened to them, or ask for help. But neither the state nor Total had made one - which, in the face of a seeming catastrophe, was a stunning and curious omission.

So I set up a survey group. Overseen by 3 managers, 6 surveyors went door to door for 5 months in Palma and 15 surrounding villages, with a survey designed according to UN guidelines, available online. They eventually visited 13,686 homes.

The provisional results (double-checked, but pre-independent audit, and with one small village yet to count) are below.

SUMMARY
1,357 dead or missing (and presumed dead after 2 years) + 224 kidnapped, making a combined total of 1,581.

BREAKDOWN OF THE DEAD AND MISSING
Civilians from Palma: 373 beheaded, 399 shot, 29 drowned, 6 miscellaneous (2 burned alive, 4 died while fleeing), 24 death details unknown, 471 missing.
Contractors and their workers: 10 beheaded, at least 45 other dead, mostly shot.

IDENTITIES
Of the 1,581, 95% are individuals identified by name, age, gender and address.

AGES
The ages of the dead, missing and kidnapped range from 2 months to 105. 184 children (under 18) are among them, variously beheaded, shot, drowned, kidnapped or disappeared.

UNACCOUNTED
I have no figures for combatant casualties - army, police or al-Shabab - though my reporting suggests several hundred were killed. I also have no figures for injuries.

Although comparisons of this sort are somewhat distasteful, for context it's worth noting that these figures make Palma 2021 the worst terror attack since 9/11, and the bloodiest disaster in the 164-year history of oil and gas.

I have contacted @TotalEnergiesPR, head of security, and board, sharing the figures and inviting them to examine the methodology. The response has been silence or, from one spokesperson, platitudes that pointedly ignore any mention of events in Palma.

This is not a PR crisis. This is not a business scandal. This is a wartime humanitarian disaster, a hidden massacre, inflicted by al-Shabab, which occurred on @TotalEnergies' watch. The company should, at the very least, pay attention.

Total's boss, @PPouyanne, likes to communicate by Twitter. So I’m hoping that with enough retweets, he might feel the need at today’s AGM to answer a few questions. Namely:

- how does he account for the killing and abduction of 1,581 people whose security he pledged to safeguard?
- what value is there in a human rights report or a €200 million community outreach program – both announced by Total this week – that makes no mention of this disaster?

- now that he can't say he didn't know what happened, and his company can no longer ignore it, what is @PPouyanne going to do?

(PS. I'm happy to share the data with anyone interested in verifying it. Ping me here.)