Islamist insurgents pushed into territory they had not touched in more than a year, storming a remote hunting camp and a nearby village in northern Mozambique and abducting as many as 20 people, including children, authorities and conflict monitors said.

The raid hit the Marangira hunting concession, on the southern edge of the vast Niassa Special Reserve, late last week. Fighters believed to belong to the Islamic State's Mozambique affiliate, known locally as Ansar al-Sunna, disabled the area's only phone mast before burning the lodge's buildings, looting roughly 15 vehicles and torching the local health post, police station and telecommunications tower, according to TimesLive and the Sowetan.

Local police say at least 11 people were marched off from the town of Marangira itself; company and diplomatic sources put the total number of missing camp workers and residents as high as 20. One person was killed and another wounded in the assault, which forced roughly 2,700 people to flee, according to a Monday update from Portuguese outlet Observador.

Among those seized was a 30-year-old South African mechanic employed at the camp. Two other South African staff made it home safely and two more remained secure elsewhere in Mozambique. Three American guests who were out on a game drive when the attack began were unharmed and were later airlifted out of the area, according to a U.S. News report citing a source familiar with the evacuation.

The lodge is part of Mozambique Wild Adventures, a hunting and conservation operation co-owned by veteran football coach Carlos Queiroz, who has managed Portugal, Real Madrid and Iran's national team and now leads Ghana. Reached by phone in Lisbon, Queiroz told Reuters that images from the site suggested "the entire establishment has been burned down" and that he was awaiting word from Mozambican military and security officials. The company had invested an estimated $3.5 million in the property over more than a decade.

A New Front

The attack marks the insurgency's first confirmed incursion into Niassa province since May 2025, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, a war-monitoring group. "The ability of one group of ISM fighters to enter Niassa and undertake that attack highlights that ISM still has an advantage in maneuverability in rural areas," ACLED analyst Peter Bofin said.

The Islamic State-linked insurgency has convulsed neighboring Cabo Delgado province since 2017, killing thousands and displacing more than a million people despite a Rwandan-led regional military intervention. Its westward push toward Niassa, one of Mozambique's poorest and most sparsely policed provinces, raises fears the conflict is outgrowing the buffer zone international forces have tried to hold.

"The ability of one group of ISM fighters to enter Niassa and undertake that attack highlights that ISM still has an advantage in maneuverability in rural areas." — Peter Bofin, ACLED conflict analyst

South Africa's Department of International Relations and Cooperation said its embassy "is working with Mozambican authorities and is monitoring the situation and developments in Niassa Province." The U.S. Embassy has advised Americans to avoid the Niassa Special Reserve and areas near the Tanzanian border. Mozambican security forces have deployed to patrol the surrounding forest, though no rescue has yet been reported.

By Monday, some residents who fled the violence had begun trickling back to Marangira, even as the fate of those abducted remained unknown. The hostages' families, and the wider safari and conservation industry that has poured tens of millions of dollars into Niassa's wilderness hoping to outrun Cabo Delgado's war, are now watching to see whether this was a one-off raid — or the start of a new front.