Maputo — The Mozambican authorities have announced the arrest of a third suspect in the murder of two catholic missionaries at the Fonte Boa mission in the western province of Tete on 6 November.

According to Tete provincial attorney Arone Nhaca, the police picked up the third suspect on Friday morning in the town of Ulongue.

Nhaca added that a magistrate in the Angonia District court in Ulongue will formalise the detention of all three men (whose names have not yet been released) on Monday.

"As a result of major patrolling work and searches in various parts of Angonia and Tsangano districts, where joint brigades from the police and the public prosecutor's office are working, we managed to arrest another suspect", said Nhaca. "We want to solve this crime as quickly as possible".

Nhaca thought that two members of the gang that attacked the mission are still at large, though the initial reports spoke of six assailants.

A Brazilian Jesuit priest, Waldyr dos Santos, and a Portuguese lay missionary, Ilda Neto Gomes, were murdered in the attack.

Nhaca said that the two members of the mission wounded by the gunmen, Jose de Andrade and Fernando Carvalho, are making a good recovery in the Angonia Rural Hospital.

Nhaca also announced that the trial will begin on Monday of five bank workers accused of stealing 10 billion old meticais (about 400,000 US dollars) from the branch of the Austral Bank in the Tete town of Songo. One of the accused is the branch manager Ana Maria Jeremias.

The theft was detected in August 2005 by an inspection team sent from the Austral Bank headquarters in Maputo.