Navigation
Script from JavaScript Kit
The Conflict with Renamo, 1976-1992
«January 1987»
Dossier MZ-0020
83. MNR Hostage Release Row Continues, While Many Abductees Remain Unaccounted For
Above: Milange, a border town on the frontier with Malawi, was affected in diverse ways by Renamo's use of Malawian territory to launch attacks, especially in the immediate aftermath of Samora's death.
As reported in December 1986, just before Christmas the MNR/Renamo had released over 60 hostages that it had abducted - although another 38 people remained unaccounted for. The largest group had been handed over to the Red Cross in Milange, close to the Malawi border, and were then flown to Maputo. In a comment piece for the Mozambican News Agency (AIM), the journalist Paul Fauvet criticised the Western press reaction to the event, which was critical of the Mozambican government, rather than of the rebels for kidnapping people in the first place.
The threat of famine continued to hang over the densely-populated Zambézia province, and in an attack in Nampula, the MNR destroyed a power station that provided electricity to Nacala, Nampula town, the Ilha de Moçambique, and Mossuril. In the south of the country, the rebels claimed to have shot down a military helicopter, and to have killed over 100 government troops, as well as a senior Tanzanian officer.
Click on the yellow folder image below to download an unsorted zipped archive of documents and press clippings in PDF format concerning the conflict between the Mozambican government and the MNR/Renamo in January 1987.
