The Mozambican parliament on Wednesday extended the mandate of the commission investigating the deaths of more than 100 opposition supporters during and after protests last November in the northern town of Montepuez, LUSA reported.

The bipartisan inquiry, which was due to submit a report in March, has been stalled since 27 January when three of its seven members were injured in a road accident.

At a closed-door meeting, allegedly for legal reasons, the legislature voted over opposition protests to extend the commission's mandate until the next plenary session in October. Only members of the ruling FRELIMO party voted on the measure. The RENAMO-Electoral Union coalition (the only parliamentary opposition) had called for the commission to be replaced, as a means to speed the investigation, due to its failure to meet deadlines and the incapacity of three of its members.

Some 40 people were killed on 9 November in Montepuez, during nationwide demonstrations called by RENAMO to protest against the results of 1999 elections. Two weeks later, over 80 oppositionists jailed in the wake of the protests were found suffocated to death in a tiny cell at the Montepuez prison.