United Kingdom aid agency, Save the Children, says Islamist militants are beheading children as young as 11 in Mozambique’s northern province of Cabo Delgado.
The BBC reports that one mother told the agency she had had to watch as her 12-year-old son was killed in this way close to where she was hiding with her other children.
More than 2,500 people have been killed and 700,000 have fled their homes since an Islamist insurgency began in 2017.
The militants are linked to the Islamic State (IS) group.
In its report, Save the Children said it had spoken to displaced families who reported gruesome scenes in the gas-rich province.
One mother, whose name was withheld to protect her identity, said her eldest child had been beheaded near where she and her other children were hiding.
“That night our village was attacked and houses were burned,” she said.
“When it all started, I was at home with my four children. We tried to escape to the woods but they took my eldest son and beheaded him. We couldn’t do anything because we would be killed too.”
The insurgents are known locally as Al-Shabab, although they have no known links to the Somali jihadi group of the same name.
The US state department has designated the insurgents a terrorist organisation.
The group has rarely given any indication about its motive, leadership or demands.
In a video last year, one militant leader said: “We occupy (the towns) to show that the government of the day is unfair. It humiliates the poor and gives the profit to the bosses.”
