Missionary 'murdered' in Moz
2004-02-27 08:40
Lisbon - A Brazilian missionary has been found dead in a town in northern Mozambique where four Roman Catholic nuns have received death threats after alleging an organ trafficking network was operating in the area, Portuguese state radio reported on Thursday.
Police found Doraci Edinger, 53, in her apartment in the town of Nampula on Tuesday, RDP said. They believe she had been murdered.
Edinger, a member of the Evangelical Lutheran church, had been in Mozambique, a former Portuguese colony, since 1998.
Earlier on Thursday four Roman Catholic missionary nuns living in the same town told Portuguese radio TSF they had narrowly escaped an armed ambush recently after presenting what they say is evidence that local children are being killed so that their organs can be sold.
"This is a very delicate moment, we don't know what is going to happen," said Sister Juliana, of the Sisters Servants of Mary Immaculate order.
Meant to kill
"Of course the guns are meant to kill, what could happen one day is that someone who speaks too much will be sentenced to be silenced forever."
The four nuns told a Spanish newspaper earlier this month that they had gathered testimony from would-be victims of the network who managed to escape and had photographs of dead children with missing organs.
They said there have also been several attempts to abduct children from the orphanage they run in Nampula.
But Mozambique's assistant attorney general, Rafael Sebastiao, said on Monday a preliminary investigation into the allegations had found no evidence that human organs had been removed from bodies and sold.
He said a team of forensic specialists had spent two weeks in the area and examined 14 cases of violent death or disappearances allegedly linked with the sale of organs as part of the probe but concluded they were not the work of an organ trafficking network.
The nuns however accuse officials of a cover-up.
The Mozambican Human Rights League has also made allegations of organ trafficking.