Mozambique and Tanzania to strengthen security – AIM report

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Mozambique and Tanzania to strengthen security – AIM report

10:35 CAT | 15 Nov 2019

Map: BBC

The Mozambican and Tanzanian governments on Wednesday expressed willingness to strengthen security between the two countries.

Mozambican Defence Minister Atanasio M’tumuke met with his Tanzanian counterpart, Hussein Mwinyi, on the margins of a ministerial meeting in Dar es Salaam of the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

According to a press release sent to AIM the two ministers “reviewed the security situation prevailing between the two countries and reaffirmed the need to hold permanent meetings at technical level for an exchange of strategic information with a view to guaranteeing the security of the two countries”.

This meeting took place the day after an attack by unidentified assailants against the Tanzanian frontier village of Ngongo, on the border with Mozambique. According to a Tanzanian police spokesperson six Tanzanian citizens were murdered in the raid and seven others were injured.

The Tanzanian authorities suspect that the raiders are connected with the terrorist groups who have been waging a low level insurgency since October 2017 in parts of the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado.

“The attackers, presumably from Mozambique, gathered the villagers together before opening fire,” said Robert Boaz, criminal investigations chief for the Tanzanian police, during a meeting near the attack site in the south-eastern district of Tandahima.

“The police and other security organs are doing everything to ensure that everyone involved is arrested and brought to justice,” he said. “No drop of Tanzanian blood can be spilled with impunity.”

Tanzanian police chief Simon Sirro said in October 2018 that Tanzanian criminals had fled “to establish their base in Mozambique”. These criminals, he said at the time, were implicated in multiple killings in 2016 and 2017 targeting police and administrative officials in the eastern district of Kibiti.

Among the insurgents arrested in Mozambique are several Tanzanians. The insurgents are believed to be motivated by islamic fundamentalism, but they have never published any kind of manifesto or list of demands, and none of their leaders are known.

Source: AIM