Mozambique: Former President Chissano defends "other ways" of approaching terrorism
FILE - Augusto Santos Silva, Minister of State and Foreign Affairs of Portugal. [File photo: DW]
The European Union is preparing to increase cooperation with Mozambique in the area of security, including logistical support and sending a mission for the formation and training of Mozambican armed forces.
“We have been working with the Mozambican authorities” on these matters, head of Portuguese diplomacy Augusto Santos Silva told DW Africa. “Just this morning, I had the pleasure of a phone call with Ms. Verónica Macamo, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation of Mozambique”.
Santos Silva reiterates that the reasons for Mozambique’s resistance to the presence in the country of international troops are well understood. “Mozambique does not want foreign troops in its territory, and we can all understand why. The European Union does not want to deploy European troops to Mozambican territory. What we want is to support Mozambican institutions, according to the proposals and requests that Mozambique sends us,” he says.
CPLP Mission
The head of Portuguese diplomacy recalls that terrorism is a global threat and, in this regard, applauds the sending of a Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) mission to Mozambique to monitor the military and humanitarian situation in Cabo Delgado. “We must support each other when we are hit by this threat,” Augusto Santos Silva says.
The mission was announced last week in Lisbon by Rui Figueiredo Soares, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cape Verde, which country currently holds the presidency of the Lusophone organisation. Aid to Mozambique will be on the agenda for the CPLP summit scheduled for July 17, in Luanda (Angola).
Bilaterally, Augusto Santos Silva recalls that Portugal has already sent almost half of its mission of around 60 men to Mozambique, now working to reinforce the training of Mozambican special troops under a technical-military cooperation perspective.
However, the head of Portuguese diplomacy refuses to comment on internal issues such as corruption and poverty in Cabo Delgado, cited by some as having helped boost extremist groups.
“Firstly, as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Portugal, I do not speak about internal issues in other countries. Secondly, if there is one thing I have learned in my professional, personal and political life, it is to identify the main issue in each circumstance,” he stresses.
Santos Silva says that it is vital at this point to help the 700,000 people who have had to flee violence in the province, and “to provide full support to Mozambican institutions in their tasks of safeguarding the security of the people and assets of the Mozambican population, and that everybody cooperates in preventing international terrorist networks from penetrating Southern Africa generally”.
This is of interest not only in Southern Africa but in Africa as a whole, as well as in Europe, Santos Silva understands, noting that “terrorism knows no borders”.
Visit to Portugal
Next week, the Minister of Defence of Mozambique, Jaime Neto, is due to visit Portugal with an agenda which also includes the critical situation in Cabo Delgado.
According to the head of Portuguese diplomacy, a bilateral agreement will be signed, resulting in an increase in bilateral technical-military cooperation between Portugal and Mozambique, with the particular aim of supporting the training of specialist Mozambican troops such as commandos and marines.
Jaime Neto’s visit comes after the visit to Mozambique last year of his Portuguese counterpart, João Gomes Cravinho, who at the time promised that Portugal would support Mozambique in the logistical organization and training of military personnel fighting terrorism in Cabo Delgado.
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