Watch: “One shouldn’t be ashamed to ask for support against terrorism” – MEP Paulo Rangel

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Watch: “One shouldn’t be ashamed to ask for support against terrorism” – MEP Paulo Rangel

2:01 CAT | 03 Dec 2020

Screen grab: STV

Portuguese MEP (Member of the European Parliament) Paulo Rangel says that Mozambique “should not be ashamed or afraid” to ask for help combatting terrorism in Cabo Delgado, O País reports today.
Rangel criticises the alleged silence of the CPLP and the PALOP on the subject, judging it impossible to end the armed violence, underway since 2017, without international assistance, and noting that Mozambique took time to request logistical support from the European Union.

The European Parliament deputy was speaking on Tuesday on the “Information Night” Stv Noticias programme, during which he stated that “one should not be ashamed to ask for support against terrorism”.

“We don’t have to be ashamed to ask for help if we need it,” Rangel said, reiterating that the fight against terrorism cannot be won alone.

To support the idea that “Mozambique should not have any problem asking for international aid”, the MEP explained that “countries like France or the United Kingdom” with “very sophisticated military forces, need international cooperation to combat terrorist outbreaks in their cities.”

In Rangel’s view, Mozambique took time to request logistical support from the European Union. “This has to be said. It could have asked for help earlier.”

However, despite urging international support, Rangel considers it necessary to respect Mozambique’s sovereignty.

“The government has to draw the limits of what it wants,” he says, since there are “always sensitive issues” involved. This does not happen “only with Mozambique”, but “with any country”, he stressed.

Rangel maintains that the request for international support need not be in terms of direct military intervention, but in assistance such as monitoring or advisory experts. “Armed conflict is always complicated, because the situation, from a humanitarian point of view, is one of a medium-term resolution, not of today to tomorrow,” he explains.

On the same programme, the MEP regretted the absence of pronouncements of solidarity and humanitarian aid from the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP) and the African Portuguese Speaking Countries (PALOP).

Countries “like Portugal, Angola and Brazil, all of them very influential” and “for different reasons [are] great friends of Mozambique and Mozambicans”, not only with regard to diplomatic relations, could do more. “They could mobilise humanitarian aid,” Rangel suggests.

The European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Affairs scheduled a debate on the situation caused by terrorism in Cabo Delgado for this Thursday (03-12).

Watch the STV interview (from 7.07 to 9.48)