Terrorists cut off children's heads in Mozambique

A mother and her children from the displaced in Mozambique.

(Father)

Children as young as 11 years old, some of whom were killed in the cycle of violence by armed terrorists in northeastern Mozambique, were killed and beheaded, according to Save the Children (Save the Children) Tuesday.

The London-based aid organization expressed its "anger and deep sadness" over reports of children being targeted in the conflict in the Cabo Delgado district in the north of the country, which has large gas resources but is witnessing a horrific armed rebellion.

The fighting in the north of the country has killed 2,600 people, more than half of them civilians, and led to the displacement of 670,000 people, according to the organization.

A mother, whose name has been withheld to protect her identity, stated that her 12-year-old son was beheaded while she was hiding with her other children.

And she continued, "That night, they attacked our village and burned our homes."

The grieving mother added, "We tried to escape to the woods, but they took my oldest son and cut off his head. We could not do anything because we would have been killed too."

Another mother recounted that she was unable to bury the body of her son, who was killed by gunmen, so she fled from her home in grief.

"After my 11-year-old son was killed, we realized that our village was no longer safe. We fled to my father's house in another village, but after a few days the attacks started there as well," she said.

The organization stated that the situation has deteriorated significantly over the past year with the escalation of attacks.

The humanitarian crisis in the region was exacerbated by a series of floods and hurricanes that struck northern Mozambique last year.

"One of our biggest concerns is that the needs of the displaced children and their families in Cabo Delgado outweigh the resources we have available to support them," said Chance Briggs, the organization's director in Mozambique.

He continued, "About one million people face acute hunger as a direct result of this conflict, whether from the displaced or the communities that host them."

An armed group known locally as "Al-Shabaab Movement" has launched a series of attacks in the region since 2017 and pledged allegiance to the terrorist organization "ISIS" in 2019, and the movement faces charges of beheading and violating the inviolability of corpses.

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