Photo: Resistência Nacional Moçambicana

Former rebel group, Renamo leader Afonso Dhlakama, being interviewed.

Afonso Dhlakama, the leader of Mozambique's main opposition party, on 3 July admitted that Renamo was responsible for ambushes on the country's main north-south highway (the EN1) in late June.

Speaking at a press conference in his bush headquarters at Satunjira, in the central district of Gorongosa, Dhlakama said the purpose of the attacks was to prevent the transport of troops and weaponry up the road to attack his headquarters.

The vehicles attacked on the stretch of road between the Save river and the small town of Muxungue, in Sofala province, were civilian buses and trucks. At least two people died, and five others were injured in these ambushes.

Dhlakama claimed that he had never wanted to attack civilians, and that when he saw one of the victims on television, he ordered the Renamo men concerned to return to base.

"It was never our intention to attack civilians", he argued. "The troops that come to Gorongosa do not come in military vehicles but in civilian ones. Hence some civilians were attacked because they were in vehicles that were believed to be carrying soldiers".

Dhlakama denied categorically that Renamo had carried out the attack on a military arsenal, belonging to the Mozambican armed forces (FADM), at Savane, also in Sofala. Seven soldiers were murdered in this raid, and an unspecified amount of weaponry was stolen.

He announced that he was willing to hold a face-to-face meeting with Mozambican President Armando Guebuza - but he would only go to Maputo, if the government withdrew the military and police forces from the vicinity of Satunjira. If the government was unwilling to accept that condition, then President Guebuza would have to come to Gorongosa for the meeting.

However, on 5 July Mozambique's ruling Frelimo Party argued strongly that any face-to-face meeting between President Guebuza and Afonso Dhlakama should be held in Maputo.

Giving Frelimo's reaction to Dhlakama's press conference, the Central Committee Secretary for Mobilisation and Propaganda, Damiao Jose, said that President Guebuza's meeting with Dhlakama last year in the northern city of Nampula, where Dhlakama was then living, was exceptional.

"It's true that, because of his simplicity and humility, President Guebuza did go to Nampula to meet the Renamo leader. But this cannot be a routine practice", said Jose.

He stressed that President Guebuza has an office in Maputo, which is where Dhlakama, like any other political leader, should be received.