Briton reported among dead as Islamists hit Mozambique town

AT least one Briton was believed to have been killed as Islamists stormed a town in Mozambique and surrounded a hotel where foreigners had taken refuge, military sources told The Sunday Telegraph.

Four other British nationals were evacuated by helicopter as jihadists known for brutal beheadings went on a bloody rampage through the northern town of Palma.

Dozens of expatriates of various nationalities are thought to have died as they were ambushed while attempting to escape from the Amarula Palma hotel, where about 200 people had been sheltering for two days.

Decapitated bodies remain scattered across Palma, according to local reports, where fighting between the extremists and security forces had raged since Wednesday. After mercenaries evacuated the last of the foreigners, the entire town was seized by the militants, security sources said.

Children as young as 11 have been beheaded by extremist groups in recent weeks as a brutal insurgency has intensified across the northern province of Cabo Delgado.

Since October 2017 at least 2,400 people have died and 700,000 have been forced to flee. The savagery of the attacks has stunned aid workers in the region.

Palma is next to gas projects worth $60 billion, led by big oil companies including Total, where many expatriate workers were employed.

Rescue efforts had been under way with at least 20 people flown to safety in helicopters before the ambush, said Lional Dyck, who runs Dyck Advisory Group (DAG), a South African private security company that works with the Mozambican government.

Those who did not attempt to flee in a 17-car convoy on Friday were ferried away on boats.

A father of three was among those killed in the attack. Meryl Knox, 59, said that her son Adrian Nel, 41, was shot in the convoy after waiting days to be rescued. “They had tried to escape and were shot in a vehicle on their way out,” Mrs Knox said.

Her husband Greg, 55, and second son Wesley Nel, 37, escaped and were rescued by DAG, and taken to nearby Afundi before being flown to Pemba.

“We know of other South Africans desperate for news of their families,” Mrs Knox said.

Jayde Alexander’s South African father, a former policeman, was among the missing. Ms Alexander, 29, said that he had been heading to the border with Tanzania, about 430 miles away, before he disappeared.

“He had seen a gun in one of the Mozambique government’s abandoned vehicles and he took it,” she said as she described his attempted escape.

Palma is a logistic centre and base for multiple international companies looking to cash in on one of the biggest gas finds in a decade.

The attack on Wednesday started hours after Total announced the resumption of works at its site after halting them due to security issues.

The Sunday Telegraph has contacted the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and Total for comment.

Officials at the Mozambican foreign ministry, defence ministry and provincial government did not immediately respond to calls or had their phones switched off yesterday.

The national police that said they were evaluating the situation without providing further details.

The Mozambican government had said that security forces were working to restore order in Palma, after it came under the three-pronged attack.

It was not immediately clear how many people, if any, remained in the hotel and how many were missing.

Cindy Cooke, a South African whose 21-year-old stepson Francois van Niekerk is in Palma, was frantically trying to get information.

His family had not heard from him since the attack started, though rescuers had been to his location yesterday and he was not there, she said.

“It’s scary. Being there is no joke. [The insurgents] are ruthless, just ruthless,” she said.

The Portuguese foreign ministry said that one of its nationals had been injured in the attack on Palma but did not specify the circumstances. The person had since been rescued, and its embassy in Maputo was working to identify other Portuguese who needed support, the ministry said in an email.

A spokesman for the British Foreign Office said: “Our High Commission in Maputo is indirect contact with authorities in Cabo Delgado to urgently seek further information on these reports.”