Mozambique: Niassa bus attack was a robbery, “not an insurgent attack” – police

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: Niassa bus attack was a robbery, “not an insurgent attack” – police

3:04 CAT | 07 Oct 2020

Mavago district, borders Cabo Delgado and Tanzania

One person was killed in an armed attack on a bus in Niassa province, northern Mozambique, on Friday, a police source told Lusa on Tuesday.

The province is adjacent to Cabo Delgado, a region ravaged by an armed insurgency for the past three years, which is causing a humanitarian crisis with over 1,000 deaths and 250,000 displaced people.

However, the spokesman for the Police of the Republic of Mozambique (PRM) in Niassa says that “there is no relationship”.

“This is not an insurgent attack. It was a ‘normal’ crime, an armed robbery, which took place at 3:00 [02:00 in Lisbon]” said Alfredo Couana, spokesman for the PRM in Niassa.

According to police, the bus stopped to remove barricades that had been placed by a group of five people in a section of Mavago district and, following that, the attack took place.

“The driver wanted to manoeuvre the bus and was shot dead,” he said.

According to the police, the group took money from the passengers, totalling 85,000 meticais (about €1,000).

The police said that the crime does not have the ‘modus operandi’ of the insurgents.

“Let it be very clear that there is no connection with the attacks and that it is a crime like others. The assailants sometimes act in this way, while the insurgents have their ‘modus operandi’, they do not attack vehicles, they already have specific targets”, said Alfredo Couana.

Some insurgent attacks in Cabo Delgado have been claimed by the ‘jihadist’ Islamic state group, but the real origin of the rebellion remains unclear.

The Cabo Delgado region is expected to receive investments of around US$50 billion (€42.4 billion) in natural gas in the coming years, led by US oil company Exxon Mobil and French company Total (which already has operations on the ground).

Source: Lusa