{"id":40325,"date":"2019-08-01T12:25:55","date_gmt":"2019-08-01T12:25:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=40325"},"modified":"2019-08-01T12:25:55","modified_gmt":"2019-08-01T12:25:55","slug":"mozambique-president-renamo-leader-sign-peace-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=40325","title":{"rendered":"Mozambique president, Renamo leader sign peace deal"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Mozambique<\/a>‘s president and the leader of Renamo, a\u00a0former rebel movement-turned-opposition party,\u00a0<\/span>have signed a peace accord to end armed hostilities.<\/p>\n

Thousands of Renamo’s remaining fighters are disarming just weeks before a visit by Pope Francis and a national election scheduled for mid-October that will test the now-political rivals’ new resolve.<\/p>\n

President Filipe Nyusi and Renamo leader Ossufo Momade shook hands and embraced after the signing on Thursday.<\/p>\n

In an address\u00a0to parliament on Wednesday, where he announced that the signing ceremony would take place at Renamo’s remote military base in the Gorongosa mountains, Nyusi said:\u00a0<\/span>“The agreement that we will sign marks the official end of the conflict between Renamo armed men and the defence and security forces, and allow for the long-lasting peace that all Mozambicans have so longed for.”<\/p>\n

The signing brings an end to a long peace negotiation process initiated by Renamo’s historic leader, Alfonso Dhlakama, who died in May last year.<\/p>\n

In the mid-1970s, Renamo fought a brutal 16-year civil war against the Frelimo government that left one million people dead before the fighting stopped in 1992.<\/p>\n

Despite the end of the civil war and the group transforming into a political party, it retained an armed wing.<\/p>\n

Fresh clashes then erupted again between government forces and Renamo soldiers from 2013 to 2016.<\/p>\n

Since 2016, the government and Renamo have been in talks, which continued after Dhlakama died from a suspected heart attack.<\/p>\n

Momade, who took over from Dhlakama, was expected to fly from Gorongosa to the capital, Maputo, after the signing ceremony, the first time he visits the capital in many years.<\/p>\n

Momade was elected legislator for the northern Nampula province in the 2015 general elections, but only attended a few parliamentary sessions in the early months.<\/p>\n

On Monday, parliament approved a new amnesty law for all crimes committed during the conflict between government and Renamo since 2014.<\/p>\n

The law offers clemency to Renamo fighters who attacked civilians and government facilities. It also paves the way for Momade to leave his mountain hideout.<\/p>\n

Justice Minister Joaquim Verissimo on Monday told parliament that the law was aimed at “political stability and to guarantee an effective and long-lasting peace”, as well as ensure “mutual trust” and help with “national reconciliation”.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Renamo began disarming its armed members as part of the peace deal that will see the fighters re-integrated into the country’s army and police.<\/p>\n

More than 5,200 Renamo fighters are to expected to surrender their weapons to the government, a condition for the peace deal to be signed on August 1.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mozambique’s president and the leader of Renamo, a\u00a0former rebel movement-turned-opposition party,\u00a0have signed a peace accord to end armed hostilities. Thousands of Renamo’s remaining fighters are disarming just weeks before a visit by Pope Francis and a national election scheduled for mid-October that will test the now-political rivals’ new resolve. President Filipe Nyusi and Renamo leader…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":40326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40325","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40325"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40325\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/40326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}