APA-Maputo (Mozambique) Japan has pledged to provide financial assistance for Mozambique in its fight against a five-year-old insurgency in the restive northern region of the southern African country.
Speaking after meeting President Filipe Nyusi in Maputo on Thursday, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Tokyo would help Mozambique counter Islamist insurgents in Cabo Delgado province.
“Japan will financially support the fight against terrorism,” Kishida told journalists.
The assistance reportedly includes air navigation equipment worth around US$22.5 million and a surveillance vessel.
Kishida said Japan in interested in seeing an end to the insurgency by Islamic State-affiliated militias since it has investments in the affected region.
“Security is crucial for the operation of Japanese companies in northern Mozambique.”
Japanese conglomerate Mitsui holds a 20-percent stake in a US$20 billion gas project led by French energy major TotalEnergies.
The project, which is ranked Africa’s single largest foreign direct investment to date, was mothballed in April 2021 after TotalEnergies withdrew all personnel from the site following jihadist attacks in province.
TotalEnergies and its partners – Japan’s Mitsui, Mozambique’s national oil and gas company ENH, Thailand’s PTT Exploration, and Indian firms ONGC Videsh Limited, Bharat Petroleum and Oil India – had previously planned to launch the project in 2024 after discovering a vast quantity of natural gas off the coast of northern Mozambique in 2010.
The 2024 launch target may no longer be possible given the two-year disruption to operations.
The project is set to make Mozambique one of the world’s 10 biggest gas exporters, according to estimates.
The insurgency has killed more than 4,600 people since October 2017 and displaced millions others from Cabo Delgado.
Kishida was on the final leg of an African tour that saw him also visiting Ghana, Egypt and Kenya earlier this week.
JN/APA