Mozambique: Top IS terrorist leader killed, clean up still continues – Nyusi

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Mozambique: Top IS terrorist leader killed, clean up still continues – Nyusi

6:48 CAT | 25 Aug 2023

President Filipe Nyusi made the statements after a meeting with his Cuban counterpart, Miguel Díaz-Canel, who began a two-day visit to the country this Friday. [Image: Twitter]

The president of Mozambique, Filipe Nyusi, said in Maputo on Friday that the “leader of the terrorists” in the country has been “put out of action” but warned that the fight against terrorism continues.

“We conveyed this message that we were continuing to fight, and I heard that the Chief of General Staff of the Armed Defence Forces of Mozambique informed the sergeants, the soldiers, the officers, that on the 22nd the leader of the terrorists in Mozambique, Ibin Omar, was put out of action,” said the head of state, after meeting with his Cuban counterpart, Miguel Díaz-Canel, who began a two-day visit to the country today.

“So it means that persecution prevails and continues right up to where the terrorists operate, in small groups,” added Filipe Nyusi.

“We have said what we have been saying, which sometimes needs to be understood well, that terrorism is not over, nor can it be said that it is over.

But we have said that those villages that were in the hands of terrorists until 2021, all of them, I mean the district capitals, have been recovered by the Defence and Security Forces, with the support of our partners from Rwanda and SAMIM [mission in Mozambique], from SADC [Southern African Development Community],” said the head of state.

The Chief of Staff of the Armed Defence Forces of Mozambique, Joaquim Rivas Mangrasse, announced today the elimination of the leader of terrorism in the country, Mozambican Bonomade Machude Omar, along with other members of the terrorist group’s leadership.

READ: Mozambique: Terrorist mastermind killed in Cabo Delgado – AIM | Watch

“From the investigation that has been carried out, and which is still ongoing, it has been established, with factual evidence, that the main leader who has been directing operations since the outbreak of terrorism in Mozambique, the Mozambican Bonomade Machude, known as Ibn [or Ibin] Omar in the bush, also known as Abu Suraka, has been put out of action,” announced General Joaquim Rivas Mangrasse in a press statement at the Maringanha barracks in Pemba.

“The images are available and deserve a definitive assessment because alongside the terrorist leader Ibn Omar, two more of his direct followers, still to be identified, were also mortally wounded in the company of more terrorists,” he added in the same statement.

Ibn Omar, considered to be the leader of the radical Islamic State group in Mozambique, was targeted by the second phase of the so-called “Golpe Duro II” operation, which is currently underway. On the ground in Cabo Delgado, the Mozambique Armed Defence Forces have been fighting terrorism since July 2021 with support from Rwanda and SADC.

“As we have been saying, terrorism is not over,” General Joaquim Rivas Mangrasse warned today, adding that the rebels are currently operating in “small, dispersed groups”.

“These are the reason for our permanent search and clean-up,” he said.

“However, we reaffirm that the enemy has been dislodged from all the district headquarters that were occupied. Once again, operations are continuing in coordination with our partners,” added the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of Mozambique.

This week, the Islamic State terrorist group claimed two attacks on the Mozambican Armed Forces in Cabo Delgado province, in the north of the country, pointing to the deaths of at least nine soldiers, but which have not yet been officially confirmed.

In two messages released by the group’s propaganda channels, it is stated that the first attack resulted from a “bomb explosion” against Mozambican forces in the district of Mocímboa da Praia without further details.

In the second alleged attack, in the same province, but in this case in the district of Macomia, the Islamic State group claims to have killed seven Mozambican soldiers and two officers in an “ambush”.

The conflict in northern Mozambique has already displaced one million people, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and caused around 4,000 deaths, according to the ACLED conflict registration project.

Source: Lusa