Mozambique has described a video showing some men in military fatigues assaulting a woman before shooting her dead as fake.
The country’s defence minister, Jamie Neto, said the people involved in doctoring the video have been arrested and would be punished.
In the footage, some uniformed men were seen flogging a naked woman with a stick while labelling her al-shabab. When the woman attempted to flee she was shot in the back.
The two-minute clip had generated outrage and international consternation, with several organisations, including Amnesty International, calling for a probe.
The Mozambican Army had also condemned the footage as “horrifying” and said it would carry out an investigation to establish whether it was authentic.
Speaking on a local television station on Wednesday, Mr Neto said the video had been edited by “malicious people” to denigrate the image of the military.
He did not give further details but said the people responsible for creating the video would be paraded in front of the public and punished.
Troops would continue with operations to restore peace in the region, Mr Neto added.
The clip was believed to have been filmed in the gas-rich Cabo Delgado province, where government troops are battling militant Islamists, known as al-Shabab.
The group have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State militant group.
They have carried out a series of attacks on villages and towns in the area over the past three years, leaving more than 1,500 people dead and at least 250,000 homeless.
Government forces have been accused of human rights abuses while trying to put down the insurgency.
Last week, Amnesty International said it had analysed and verified videos showing attempted beheadings, torture and other ill treatment of prisoners, the dismemberment of alleged fighters and possible extrajudicial executions.
Mozambican government denied the allegations, saying the insurgents were known to “impersonate soldiers”.
