(Maputo) Mozambique police announced on Monday the death of a Tanzanian jihadist leader responsible for major attacks in the north of the country, killed in an operation by the security forces.
Posted at 3:05 p.m.
Tuahil Muhidim notably led the 2020 attack which enabled the capture of Mocimboa da Praia, the northern port where cargo ships arrived on behalf of the major gas projects underway in the region.
He was killed on Saturday morning by Mozambican and Rwandan forces, the general commander of the police, Bernardino Rafael, announced on national radio.
He was also accused of kidnapping two Brazilian nuns for three weeks in 2020.
In the same operation, Mozambican and Rwandan security forces killed another rebel and seized two weapons, he added.
“The operations of the security forces are having an effect, the terrorists are weakened,” he said, saying that seven rebel leaders had been killed in the past two months.
Since late 2017, armed groups that have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group have been terrorizing northern Mozambique, including the province of Cabo Delgado. The violence in this predominantly Muslim region has already claimed 3,500 lives and forced 820,000 people to flee their homes.
Rwanda and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), which brings together 16 states, sent at least 3,000 soldiers in July-August to support the Mozambican army.
The attacks also caused the suspension of projects for the exploitation of underwater natural gas reserves off the coast of the region, representing billions of dollars of investment.