Mocímboa: 15 attackers and 4 policemen die in armed clashes – report

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mocímboa: 15 attackers and 4 policemen die in armed clashes – report

8:50 CAT | 06 Oct 2017

Notícias

Mocímboa da Praia, Cabo Delgado province, has been calmer since the first hours of Friday. Clashes between the Police of the Republic of Mozambique and a group of 30 armed men took over the village yesterday at dawn .

According to data reported today by online Folha de Maputo, police killed fifteen (15) alleged thugs who attacked four (4) positions of the Defence and Security Forces.

There are casualties in the PRM, says the same source: four (4) police officers were reportedly killed by members of a group of ‘evildoers’. Police seem to be their only target in Mocímboa da Praia. Their motivations are unknown.

mocimboa.pinnaclenews — Picture: Facebook Egídio Vaz

Police authorities have arrested fifteen (15) people accused of links to this group, consisting mainly of young assailants. Among the detainees are some religious leaders ( sheik or maulana) in Mocímboa da Praia, reports Folha de Maputo.

Meawhile, Mocímboa da Praia remains literally paralysed. The population left the village to flee the clashes. State institutions remain closed while authorities try to restore order.

Police are the main and exclusive target of the attackers in Mocímboa da Praia, in Cabo Delgado. There are no reports of attacks directed at other state or private institutions, including commercial banks.

Evacuating the wounded

All economic and social activities were paralysed in Mocímboa, including medical assistance to the wounded who were, therefore, supposed to have been transferred from Mocímboa da Praia Rural Hospital to the Pemba Provincial Hospital, Diário de Moçambique reports.

A hospital source told Diáro de Moçambique that the ambulance from the Mocimboa da Praia Rural Hospital, trying to approach the site of the military confrontations to assist victims, ended up falling in an insurgent ambush.
.
“We can not send the wounded to Pemba because there are no safety conditions for the movement of people and vehicles either inside or outside the village . The situation is of real war and military reinforcements are taking a long time to get here “- lamented the hospital source.

No official source was willing to talk about the military confrontations in Mocimboa da Praia, since the district administrator was absent and municipal structures simply did not answer phone calls.

The population was leaving the village to safer areas, before the worst possible military response from the government happens.

It should be recalled that last year a complaint had been lodged, stating that Somali Islamic group, Al-Shabaab linked to terrorist units, was already operating in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado, where it conducted mobilisation activities and spread propaganda on mandatory use of burqa by all Muslim women.

The complaint was made public in June in the city of Pemba by the delegation of the Mozambican Islamic Council in Cabo Delgado,during Eid-Ul-Fitr celebrations. It named Pemba and the districts of Mocimboa da Praia and Chiúre, as the points where the group was carrying out its activities.

The warning of the Islamic Council would have been directed to the provincial Government, which has the responsibility to control state borders and regulates religious activities in the Cabo Delgado. At the time, the Islamic Council also called on the population of Cabo Delgado not to blindly follow instructions from agents of the Al-Shabaab group should they undermine religious harmony and peaceful coexistence among Muslim believers and other people.

Sheikh Velez Brugraf of the Islamic Council stressed on the occasion that the Al-Shabaab group was of no religious interest, given that it spreads controversial information on solidarity, cooperation, brotherhood and harmony among Muslim brothers.

“This group, therefore, does not mean anything religious, which is why religious confessions must pay attention nd open their eyes to the movement of strangers in mosques. We must be careful, so that we do not receive individuals who can later sow mourning among the Mozambican family, as in the Middle East. ”

Source: Folha de Maputo / Diário de Moçambique