Children Die As Police Fire On Food Protesters
<!-- SHARE --> <script src="http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/connect.php/js/FB.Share" type="text/javascript"></script> <!-- end SHARE --> 6:42pm UK, Wednesday September 01, 2010
Emma Hurd, Africa correspondent
Police have opened fire on crowds of demonstrators in Mozambique, killing at least six people including two children.
<object data="/sky-news/app/skynewsflash/OBU_Player_30.swf" name="obuPlayer" id="obuPlayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="225" width="400"></object>Protests erupted in the capital, Maputo, after the government ordered a 30% increase in the price of bread. Officers fired live rounds to disperse the protesters after they ran out of rubber bullets, one official said. The city was shrouded in a haze of smoke and tear gas, as demonstrators set alight tyres in the streets.
The police confirmed that two children had been killed in the suburb of Mafalala but said that only one adult had died in the riots. Hospital officials said the number of dead was at least six, with at least 11 people injured. Witnesses claimed the police fired indiscriminately. “They were killing honest people,” one man said.
City shrouded in a haze of smoke and tear gas
The violence is the worst to hit the southern African nation since 2008 when rising food prices prompted riots in developing nations around the world. The United Nations says global food price inflation has now reached a similar level, leading to fears of a repeat of the widespread unrest.
Those joining the protests in Maputo claimed they could no longer afford to feed their families. “Everything is too expensive, they increase bread, rice, fuel, everything,” one man said. Seven in 10 of Mozambique’s population live below the poverty line and local human rights campaigners claim anger has been building for months.
“We call for everyone to be calm and serene,” said Mozambique’s interior minister Jose Pacheco. The government increased the price of bread following a sharp rise in the global price of wheat, triggered in part by speculation on the agricultural commodities markets. As the riots spread throughout Maputo, shops and businesses closed and there were reports of looting.
