[ad_1]
Jihadists attacked a village near a massive gas project in northern Mozambique’s Cabo Delgado province on Tuesday in the shadow group’s latest assault, sources said.
Gunmen attacked the small town of Monjane, they said.
“The population fled to the resettlement village of Senga,” which is five kilometers (three miles) away in the project area, a security source told AFP.
The source was unable to provide details about the victims.
The group, known locally as Al-Shabab, launched attacks in the predominantly Muslim province in October 2017. Last year, it declared allegiance to the so-called Islamic State group.
More than 2,300 people have died, according to the US NGO’s Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), while the government says at least 500,000 people have fled their homes.
Cabo Delgado is the site of a plan to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant, the centerpiece of a government dream to reap riches from Mozambique’s offshore energy fields.
French company Total, a major investor in the scheme, told AFP that it was “closely monitoring the situation” in Cabo Delgado, but did not confirm the attack.
Monjane was attacked in May 2018. Ten people were beheaded, some of them children.
Mozambique’s armed forces, which have been fighting to contain the insurgency, said last week that they had carried out several operations in which they killed 37 jihadists, seized firearms and destroyed vehicles and boats used for coastal attacks.
