Republic of Mozambique President Armando Guebuza has warned of foreign interference in the internal affairs of this Southern African state. The country has recently been the focus of natural resource exploration., a photo by Pan-African News Wire File Photos on Flickr.
Mozambique: 4 soldiers killed in road attacks
November 7, 2013
MAPUTO. — Mozambique’s state media says Renamo rebel fighters killed four soldiers in two separate attacks amid escalating violence in the central part of the country.
The Mozambique News Agency reported yesterday that three troops died in an ambush a day earlier by gunmen loyal to Renamo, the former rebel movement that fought a civil war after independence from Portugal in 1975.
The report says Renamo fighters killed one soldier and injured three civilians, one of whom was pregnant, in a second attack on vehicles with a military escort on the country’s main north-south highway.
Renamo signed a peace deal in 1992 with Mozambique’s ruling party Frelimo. Relations between the two parties have deteriorated ahead of municipal elections on 20 November and national elections next year.
Meanwhile, five people, including a South African, were wounded on Monday in an attack by suspected Renamo militants in central Mozambique, state media reported.
Gunmen fired indiscriminately at a convoy of vehicles which were travelling from Save to Muxungue on Monday afternoon.
The gunmen then ransacked goods and fled to the bush, Radio Mozambique reported. Of the two critically wounded, the South African was shot in the chest and in one of his arms.
Muxungue-Save area has been the scene of attacks by militants of the former rebel movement since October 21, when the army overran the Renamo bush camp in Satunjira, where Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama had been staying for more than a year.
However, campaigning for Mozambique’s fourth municipal polls kicked off on Tuesday amid the country’s rising political tension and the uncertainty of the main opposition party’s boycott threat.
Ten political parties, including the ruling Frelimo, will take part in elections for 53 municipalities slated for November 20.
Mozambique’s National Elections Commission appealed to political parties and candidates to make the campaign for the forthcoming municipal elections a festive occasion, and to avoid insults and vandalism.
But Renamo said it will not participate in the polls unless the current electoral law is
changed.
For Renamo, the current electoral law favours the ruling party in power since independence in 1975.
Renamo argues that Frelimo uses the law to rig elections in the country.
In fact Renamo has lost all the polls, since democracy was achieved under the Rome peace agreement signed by both parties in 1992.
Renamo’s national spokesperson Fernando Mazanga said Renamo will also boycott next year’s general elections, if the electoral law is not changed.
“We will not participate in them either,” he told Xinhua.
— AP-Xinhua.
No comments:
Post a Comment