Mozambique: UN Secretary-General envoy available to dialogue with Mariano Nhongo

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: UN Secretary-General envoy available to dialogue with Mariano Nhongo

3:07 CAT | 08 Jun 2020

Mariano Nhongo, leader of the self-proclaimed Renamo Military Junta. [File photo: DW]

The UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy to Mozambique says he has already made first telephone contact with the leader of the self-proclaimed Renamo Military Junta and that he is willing to meet him personally.

The UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy to Mozambique, Mirko Manzoni, says he is willing to hold talks with Mariano Nhongo, dissident leader of the self-proclaimed Military Junta of the Mozambican National Resistance (Renamo), which stands accused of carrying out armed attacks in central Mozambique.

“We are available for talks, if the goal is peace,” Mirko Manzoni said last Friday (06/06).

Speaking to the press after the demobilization of Renamo guerrillas under the Peace and National Reconciliation Agreement at the Savane administrative post in Sofala province, the UN Secretary-General’s personal envoy said that Mariano Nhongo’s claims could be discussed, but the “important thing is to see if they are possible and relevant”.

“We all have demands,” Mirko Manzoni said, adding that he had already made telephone contact with Mariano Nhongo and that he was available to discuss the matter in person.

Ddr.dw_ — *President Filipe Nyusi of Mozambique and Renamo leader Ossufo Momade, with weapons handed over by dozens of Renamo guerrillas.*

“I am neither afraid nor troubled. There is no problem in the world that cannot be solved with dialogue. Dialogue is more important and better than all weapons,” Mirko Manzoni said.

Like António Guterres’ personal envoy, the Mozambique head of state also expressed his openness to dialogue with Nhongo. “We are available to talk to them and hear what they say wrong with the inclusion, reconciliation and rehabilitation process,” Filipe Nyusi said last Friday in Savane.

On the same day, Mariano Nhongo again stressed “that the DDR has no legs to walk”.

European Union calls for rigour

The European Union said, also last Friday, that it fully supported the timetable defined for the Renamo combatants’ demobilisation, calling in a statement for both parties to strictly implement the agreement in order to “to guarantee lasting stability in the country”.

Source: Deutsche Welle