Mozambique attacks: US available to support fight against armed groups

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Mozambique attacks: US available to support fight against armed groups

5:47 CAT | 05 Feb 2019

A Mozambican soldier in Naunde village, torched by armed men in June 2017. File photo: DW

The United States government has expressed its willingness to help Mozambique combat the unidentified groups that have been carrying out attacks in remote villages in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado.

“We are available and would like to help Mozambique in this process [in combating the unidentified groups in the north of the country], as long as this is useful to the country,” Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Maputo Bryan Hunt told Lusa.

Hunt was speaking on the sidelines of a seminar co-organised with the African Centre for Strategic Studies in Maputo in the context of the United States-backed military exercises in Pemba, northern Mozambique.

Hunt said the development of natural gas exploration projects in the region made it increasingly important to reinforce local security, and recalled the “history of cooperation between Mozambique and the United States in the field of defence”.

“We already have several programs in the maritime field, and we would like to increase the level of cooperation between the two countries,” the US Embassy Deputy Chief of Mission said.

The US-backed military exercise in Mozambique involves about 100 US military personnel, as well as the armed forces of Mozambique and of 15 other states.

It is in that region that North American oil companies Anadarko and Exxon Mobil lead ongoing investments to extract natural gas from what are considered the world’s largest reserves within the next four to five years.

Since October 2017, remote villages in the province of Cabo Delgado have been the target of armed attacks by unidentified groups, resulting in about 150 deaths among residents, alleged attackers and members of the security forces.

The violence in Cabo Delgado (2,000 kilometres from Maputo, in the far north of Mozambique, near Tanzania) has been ongoing since an armed attack on police in Mocimboa da Praia by a group from a local mosque preaching insurgency against the state, whose habits had been a source of friction with residents for at least two years.

Since Mocimboa da Praia, the attacks [ suspected to be connected to the same type of group] have almost always occurred far from asphalt roads and have not so far damaged the infrastructure of petroleum companies exploiting natural gas in the area.

However, the proximity of the latest attacks has caused the operations o to be conducted under “enhanced security,” oil company Anadarko, which is coordinating work on the Afungi peninsula in Palma district, Cabo Delgado, told Lusa.

Source: Lusa