ISIL-LINKED ATTACKERS BEHEAD 50 PERSONS, ABDUCT SEVERAL WOMEN IN NORTHERN MOZAMBIQUE
ISIL-linked assailants have beheaded about 50 persons and abducted several women in a brutal attack in Mozambique.
Bernardino Rafael, Commander-General of Mozambique’s police, who made this known on Monday, November 9, said the attack took place from Friday, November 6 to Sunday, November 8.
He said the assailants attacked several villages in the districts of Miudumbe and Macomia, killing civilians, abducting women and children and burning down homes.
The Police Chief revealed that body parts of 5 adults and 15 boys were found on Monday, November 9, scattered across a forest in Muidumbe.
“They burned the houses then went after the population who had fled to the woods and started with their macabre actions,” Rafael said.
Sources say the attackers fired shots sporadically and set homes ablaze when they began their raid.
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They then took residents of the affected communities to a local football field and killed them in cold blood.
“Police learnt of the massacre committed by the insurgents through reports of people who found corpses in the woods,” an officer in the neighbouring Mueda district who pleaded anonymity said.
In recent months, the armed group has caused mayhem to several communities in Northern Mozambique; killing defenseless residents, and abducting several.
In April 2020, attackers shot dead and beheaded more than 50 youths for allegedly refusing to join their ranks.
According to reports, security personnel in Cabo Delgado province have been fighting the armed group which pledged allegiance to ISIL since 2017.
The unrest has killed more than 2,000 people since 2017; more than half of them civilians, according to the US-based Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.
The violent attacks in Cabo Delgado have caused a humanitarian crisis with more than 300,000 internally displaced persons and 712,000 in need of humanitarian assistance, according to an Amnesty International report released last month
Cabo Delgado is home to a multibillion-dollar liquefied natural gas project by French multinational Total.
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