Pemba is the capital of a province at war, and it is also a functioning port city where oil and gas contractors, aid workers, officials and a few tourists come and go every day. Both things are true. The question for anyone planning a trip is where the line between them runs…
Pemba was a quiet place for most of its life. A colonial port and provincial capital on a vast natural bay, it was far enough from the wars of the…
In June 2026 more than 12,000 people in Cabo Delgado were forced from their homes, according to the UN's humanitarian office, OCHA. Over the first…
Palma sits at the far northern tip of Mozambique, a few kilometres from the Rovuma River and the Tanzanian border. Most of the money in Cabo Delgado…
Between 22 and 29 June 2026 Gemfields held its first "Trade Select" auction of rough rubies from Montepuez, in Cabo Delgado's interior west of Pemba…
In the early hours of 5 October 2017, about thirty armed men attacked three police stations in Mocímboa da Praia, a port town in the north of Cabo…
For most people, Pemba is reached by air, and in the current war that's the only sensible way. Pemba Airport, code POL, a few kilometres from the…
Mocímboa da Praia is where Cabo Delgado's war started, on 5 October 2017, with a pre-dawn attack on the town's police stations (the insurgency…
Pemba is spread along the southern shore of its bay, and its neighbourhoods tell the story of the city in order: the colonial port, the modern…
North of Pemba, a chain of about 32 coral islands runs up the coast of Cabo Delgado towards the Tanzanian border. These are the Quirimbas: mangrove…
