Portugal’s Foreign Ministry “closely” monitoring abduction of Portuguese woman in Mozambique

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Portugal’s Foreign Ministry “closely” monitoring abduction of Portuguese woman in Mozambique

12:14 CAT | 14 Apr 2021

Picture: Miramar

Portugal’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is “closely” monitoring the abduction of a 49-year-old Portuguese woman in Mozambique, and is “in contact with the local authorities”.

In a written note issued on Tuesday, the Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs emphasised that it was “following this case closely, and [is] in contact with the local authorities”.

And the note added that the ministry “has already indicated [to the local authorities] its availability to collaborate in the investigation, through the Embassy and the Consulate General of Portugal in Maputo”.

“We are currently looking for all possible information to help this compatriot,” the note sent to Lusa by the ministry led by Augusto Santos Silva reads.

A 49-year-old Portuguese woman residing in Nampula, northern Mozambique, was kidnapped on Tuesday outside the Consulate General of Portugal in Maputo, Mozambican police said.

The abduction occurred at 11:00 a.m., just after the victim left the building on Avenida Mao Tse Tung, PRM spokesman in Maputo City, Leonel Muchina, said.

As she was heading to her car, she was “intercepted” by unknown individuals in a light vehicle armed with a weapon thought to be an AKM47, the PRM spokesman said, while not explicitly stating the victim’s nationality.

However, another source following the case told Lusa that the victim has Portuguese nationality, and had gone to the Consulate to renew her documents.

The victim, a resident of Nampula, is the wife of a businessman active in the hospitality industry in Nampula province.

According to Mozambican authorities, the group of kidnappers dragged the victim to the car, in which they fled.

“We did a reconstruction of the crime,” Muchina added.

This is the second kidnapping recorded by the authorities in the city of Maputo in less than 48 hours. On Sunday, a businessman was kidnapped on Avenida Romão Fernandes Farinha, in downtown Maputo, shortly after parking his vehicle near his home.

Since the beginning of 2020, the Mozambican authorities have registered more than 10 abductions in the country’s main cities, the victims almost always entrepreneurs or their families.

In October of that year, a group of businesspeople in the city of Beira, Sofala province, central Mozambique, suspended their activities for three days in protest against the wave of abductions in the country.

The Confederation of Economic Associations of Mozambique (CTA), the country’s largest employers association, has also demanded on several occasions a more proactive fight against this type of crime, and even the Mozambican president, Filipe Nyusi, has demanded sterner measures.

Watch the T Miramar report n this kidnapping.