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FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: Lusa]
Military operations carried out in Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province with the support of foreign forces have achieved “remarkable progress” in the fight against rebel attacks in the region, according to the country’s minister of defence.
“Since the deployment of the Southern African Development Community (SAMIM) military mission in 2021, the combined actions of this mission, in addition to those of the Armed Defence Forces of Mozambique, have resulted in remarkable progress, also recognising, for this purpose, the support of the military personnel of Rwanda,” said the minister, Cristóvão Chume, according to the text of a speech sent to Lusa by the Ministry of Defence.
Chume spoke on Tuesday during a meeting of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Organ on Politics, Defence and Security in Windhoek, the capital of Namibia.
While hailing the progress made in the fight against rebels in northern Mozambique, the minister stressed the need for further “appropriate” measures, as the insurgents’ new strategy is to split into small groups to continue carrying out armed attacks.
“The reinvigorated surveillance actions of the Armed Defence Forces of Mozambique have not allowed the terrorists to expand into other regions of the country, and their pursuit and combat must be continued,” said Chume, according to the text.
In the final communiqué of Tuesday’s meeting, SADC governments called for the strengthening of the operational capacity of the joint military force in Cabo Delgado
They also “expressed condolences” to the governments of the Kingdom of Lesotho, the Republics of Botswana and Zambia and the United Republic of Tanzania “and their families for the loss of their citizens,” without giving details of the number of victims.
In addition to the presidents of Namibia, Zambia, South Africa and DR Congo, the extraordinary summit of the SADC Organ on Politics, Defence and Security was attended by the heads of government of Lesotho and Eswatini (formerly Swaziland).
The province of Cabo Delgado has been plagued by conflict since 2017, with armed rebel groups terrorising the population – looting and massacring in villages and towns across the province. Responsibility for many of the attacks have been claimed by the local arm of the self-proclaimed Islamic State in the region.
The conflict has already caused more than 4,000 deaths (data from The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project) and displaced at least 1 million people, according to Mozambique’s own authorities.
Since July 2022, a military offensive run from Maputo, with support from Rwanda and later the SADC, has succeeded in improving the security situation in the region, to a point that had not been done in years. It has recovered control of localities that were held by the rebels, such as the town of Mocímboa da Praia, which had been occupied since 2020.
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