Africa-Press – Mozambique. The Mozambican Ministry of Defence on Friday (06-01) affirmed that the Mozambican Armed Defence Forces (FADM) were being re-equipped in time to deal with new outbreaks of armed violence in the north of the country.
“The FADM are indeed being re-equipped,” said Jorge Lionel, national director of human resources at the Ministry of Defence, quoted by Rádio Moçambique.
Despite acknowledging that “resources are limited”, Lionel said that in recent years there has been “an ever-increasing investment in equipment” for the Mozambican military.
“There is a feeling that the scenario is no longer the same as we had, for example, five years ago,” Lionel stressed, adding that there had also been staff training to respond to “requested situations”.
Cabo Delgado province has been facing an armed insurgency for five years with some attacks claimed by the extremist Islamic State group.
In the districts of Muidumbe and Macomia, new incursions have been recorded in remote areas in recent days, which local authorities believe are instigated by rebel groups fleeing military operations launched by government forces with support from the Community of Southern African Development (SADC) and Rwanda.
As a result of these new rebel incursions, Mozambican government forces announced the launch of an operation to destroy terrorist bases on the boundary between the two districts.
The insurgency has led to a military response since July 2021 with the support of Rwanda and the SADC, liberating districts near the province’s natural gas projects, but new attacks have taken place in the south of the region and in the neighbouring province of Nampula.
The conflict has already displaced one million people, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and caused around 4,000 deaths, according to the ACLED conflict registration project.
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