Just In: Jihadists kill 12 in Mozambique

Mozambique police said 12 persons have been killed in suspected attack by Jihadists in the country, two months after a similar attack claimed same death toll.

Thousands of villagers, frightened by the massacre, fled the area into neighbouring Tanzania, police sources said Sunday.

Early Friday, “there was an attack in Nangane district, where there are no security patrols. The attackers killed 12 people, mostly women and children,” a police source in Cabo Delgado province, who asked not to be named, told AFP.

The attack took place in the village of Chicuaia Velha, just a few kilometres (miles) from Tanzania, forcing several thousand people to cross the border to seek safety, police said.

A local journalist said the villagers were killed by machete or died when their houses were set on fire by the attackers.

It was the third such incident in the last month in Cabo Delgado, leaving 20 dead in all.

The authorities have responded with a crackdown, rounding up some 200 suspects.

Over the past year, hardline Islamists have been active in the region, stoking unrest just as the government in Maputo is pushing ahead with oil and gas development in the province.

In an attack in September, 12 persons were also killed and 14 injured in an attack by jihadists on a village in a gas-rich region of northern Mozambique.

Since 2017 October, Mozambique’s golden vision to exploit its gas reserves has been thrown into doubt by an explosion of bloodthirsty assaults in the region where the industry plans to base its hub.

“Ten people killed were shot by firearms and two burnt (to death) after 55 houses were charred. A person was beheaded after being shot dead” in the northern village of Paqueue, the police claimed then.

Details of the latest attack still being awaited.