At least three US citizens have been evacuated after suspected insurgents attacked and burned a safari camp co-owned by veteran football coach Carlos Queiroz in northern Mozambique, according to a source familiar with the incident.
The attack targeted a lodge near the Niassa Special Reserve, one of Africa’s largest protected wilderness areas and close to Cabo Delgado province, where Mozambique has battled an Islamic State-linked insurgency since 2017.
Queiroz, who currently coaches Ghana’s national football team, said he was waiting for the country’s military and security authorities to establish precisely what had happened.
“From the images I have access to, it appears that the entire establishment has been burned down,” Queiroz said by telephone from Lisbon.
He added that insecurity had made the area inaccessible and that he had not received direct information from people at the scene.
A source speaking on condition of anonymity said the three Americans were away hunting when the assault began. Camp employees reportedly fled as the attackers set fire to the property, prompting a response from the Mozambican military.
The source said there were no confirmed deaths.
However, Zitamar News, an independent publication covering Mozambique, reported that fatalities may have occurred. Regional security analyst Tertius Jacobs separately said insurgents were believed to have abducted several civilians.
Neither the alleged deaths nor the reported abductions could immediately be independently verified.
Jacobs, an analyst with Focus Group, said the attack occurred near Marangira village in Niassa province. The assailants allegedly looted supplies before retreating in the direction of neighbouring Cabo Delgado.
He said available information supported reports that three Americans had been caught up in the incident, although casualty and abduction figures remained uncertain.
The US State Department confirmed that its embassy in Mozambique was aware of an attack on a hunting lodge close to the Niassa Special Reserve but did not say whether any American citizens had been affected.
US authorities had previously warned citizens against travelling to the reserve, saying militant groups had targeted luxury hunting lodges in and around the area and taken hostages.
Mozambique’s government did not immediately comment on the attack.
The country’s northern insurgency has killed thousands of people and forced hundreds of thousands from their homes since violence erupted in gas-rich Cabo Delgado nearly a decade ago. Militant activity has periodically spilled into neighbouring Niassa province.
In a similar attack inside the Niassa Reserve last year, a tourist camp was destroyed and six people, including four wildlife rangers, were killed during clashes.
The reserve’s big-game hunting season runs from May to November and regularly attracts visitors from the United States.
