Why northern Mozambique’s surging violence is worsening displacement crisis

What the report says

Mozambique’s government has opened a two-day forum to discuss the future of people displaced by the conflict in the northern Cabo Delgado region, as violence there enters its ninth year. Al Jazeera reports that fighting between Mozambican forces and an ISIL-affiliated armed group locally known as al-Shabab, or Islamic State Mozambique Province, has intensified again since late 2025, deepening an already severe humanitarian crisis.

The article says the latest wave of attacks has reached all 17 districts of Cabo Delgado for the first time, forcing some long-term host communities to flee and causing repeated displacement for many families. The United Nations says more than 1.3 million people have fled their homes since the conflict began, including about 100,000 displaced in late 2025 alone. Between January and July, at least 28,163 more people were displaced, with women and children making up most of that group.

Al Jazeera says the surge in violence is unfolding alongside shrinking aid capacity. Several humanitarian organizations have reduced or suspended operations in the north amid international funding cuts, while the UN response is reaching only part of the population it had planned to assist. UNICEF estimates about 1.8 million people in the area need help, including around one million children. The region is also coping with cyclones and floods, which has added to food insecurity and housing damage.

The report places the crisis in the context of a conflict that began in 2017 after attacks in Mocimboa de Praia and spread across one of Mozambique’s poorest but resource-rich regions. It says heavy troop deployments, including forces from Rwanda and the regional SADC bloc, helped push fighters back earlier, but the group appears to have regrouped through kidnapping, illegal taxation and forced recruitment.