MAPUTO, Mozambique
The head of the Southern African Development Community Military Mission (SAMIM) in Cabo Delgado warns that the terrorist threat there persists, despite the setbacks that the rebels have suffered.
“We are stabilizing the
situation, but we cannot say that we have completely overcome terrorism,” Mpho
Molomo said during a lecture at the Eduardo Mondlane University in Maputo.
According to the SAMIM head of
mission, the groups that have terrorized the province since 2017 are still at
large in the bush, sporadically carrying out counter-offensives which can only
be stopped with the cooperation of the forces of the Southern African
Development Community (SADC).
“We have to cooperate to
ensure that if there is an attack on this side, the terrorists are blocked on
the other side,” Mpho Molomo noted, acknowledging that foreign forces
supporting Mozambique in the fight against terrorism have not yet destroyed all
the rebel bases.
The head of SAMIM also warned
of the trauma that the conflict had inflicted on women and children.
“I had the opportunity to
visit some of the [IDP] reception centres, and it’s shocking to see how brutal
people can be. I met women who were raped in the forests. When they capture a
woman, they first test her for AIDS, and if she has the negative result, they
take her as a wife,” he declared.
Cabo Delgado province, in
northern Mozambique, is rich in natural gas, but has been terrorized since 2017
by armed rebels, with some attacks claimed by the Islamic State extremist
group.
According to the International
Organisation for Migration (IOM), about 784,000 persons have been internally
displaced by the conflict, which has killed about 4,000, according to the ACLED
conflict registry project.
Since July last year, an
offensive by government troops, with external support, has increased security,
recovering several parts of Cabo Delgado from rebel control, notably the town
of MocĂmboa da Praia, which had been occupied since August, 2020.
In addition to SADC, the
Mozambican forces have had the support of soldiers and police from Rwanda,
within the scope of cooperation in the field of defence between the two states. - Deutsche Welle
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