The New Yorker, May 22, 1989 P. 43
REPORTER AT LARGE about Mozambique. The main cause of the countrywide suffering is the war being waged against the govt. (called Frelimo) by the Resistencia Nacional Mocambicana, or Renamo. The war started in 1976 & intensified after 1981. It has destroyed the national economy, most of the country's transportation & communication systems, and much of rural society. According to recent estimates more than 600,000 Mozambicans have died in the war, more than 2 million have been driven from their homes, and more than 6 million are currently facing severe food shortages. The govt. insists that the war is a case of external aggression -that S. Africa, its powerful white-ruled neighbor, is using Renamo as a proxy force.