The Mozambique bishops conference said it has yet to receive any details on the murder of Bishop Osório Citora Afonso of Quelimane, who was shot dead in his residence in June. Source: OSV News.
In a September 4 statement published after the conclusion of its plenary assembly, the bishops conference said the fact that “perpetrators and circumstances of his murder have not yet been clarified leaves us perplexed”.
“Bishop Osório’s death has caused profound sorrow in the Diocese of Quelimane and throughout the Mozambican population, which still questions how it is possible that a pastor who loved life, peace, and his people could be murdered in his own home,” the statement read.
The bishop, who also served as apostolic administrator of the Beira Archdiocese and as secretary general of the bishops conference, was found dead from a gunshot wound to the chest at his residence in the early hours of June 6.
In a statement sent later that day to the pontifical charity Aid to the Church in Need, Archbishop Inácio Saúre of Nampula, president of the Mozambique bishops’ conference, said that the prelate was found “lifeless and in strange circumstances that have yet to be clarified”.
The bishop’s murder came just one month after a Catholic church in northern Mozambique was targeted in an attack by militants of the Islamic State group, which has carried out attacks against Christians and Muslims in the country since 2017.
In its recent statement, the bishops conference said Bishop Citora Afonso’s violent death “at the hands of an assassin was a harsh blow to the heart of the Catholic Church in Mozambique and continues to cause us grief”.
“We have lost a brother who was still young and from whom much was expected,” the bishops wrote. The murdered prelate had turned 54 on May 6, exactly one month before he was found dead.
“We regret that, despite the efforts made to date, nothing is known from the competent authorities regarding what transpired,” the bishops wrote.
“The answers to the questions we are all asking remain missing: who exactly killed Bishop Osório? Who were the intellectual and material perpetrators of this violent death? What were the motives behind the murder?”
“Three months after the event, we continue to await answers to these questions.”
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Mozambique bishops say questions remain unanswered three months after bishop’s murder (By Junno Arocho Esteves, OSV News)
