murdered exile at centre of coup plot sufraces in zagreb

'Murdered' exile at centre of coup plot surfaces in Zagreb
Ian Traynor in Zagreb and Giles Tremlett in Madrid
Thursday April 28, 2005
The exiled opposition leader of Equatorial Guinea, who British-led mercenaries sought to install in power in an abortive coup, surfaced in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, yesterday after vanishing more than a month ago, feared murdered.

The reappearance of Severo Moto, whom the old-Etonian and former SAS officer Simon Mann - with funding from Sir Mark Thatcher - had planned to make president of the oil rich west African country, simply added more confusion, however, to the story of his disappearance.

Mr Moto surfaced yesterday in an interview given to a Croatian news magazine, Globus. His reappearance and the interview came as a surprise even to those closest to him in his Spanish-based exile opposition movement, who had begun to believe Spanish government concerns that he had been killed.

In his interview Mr Moto claimed both that he had been lured to Zagreb so he could be murdered and that he had gone there to hide from would-be assassins. Those assassins, he implied, were in cahoots with the government of Spain - a country where he has lived as a political refugee for more than 15 years.

Mr Moto is being sheltered by "Croatian friends" in a working class suburb of Zagreb and is likely to remain in hiding for the time being, fearing for his life, according to Globus.

The opposition leader disappeared from Madrid last month. Last week Spanish officials - whose intelligence services had lost track of him - told Madrid newspapers there was a growing belief that he had been murdered.

Mr Moto claimed Spanish authorities wanted him dead because he was frustrating national and business interests in the small, but oil-rich west African state which was a Spanish colony until 1968.

"The Spanish secret services, political and business circles are interested in good relations between Spain and Equatorial Guinea. As leader of the opposition and the most popular politician in Guinea, I am an obstacle ... They want to get rid of me," Mr Moto told the magazine.

He said he had been warned by well-connected friends in Madrid to flee Spain last month, so he took a plane to Rome and then on to the Croatian Adriatic cities of Split and Dubrovnik.

From there he was taken sailing for a few days around the Adriatic, he told Globus.

He returned briefly to Spain before flying to Zagreb, where he has been in hiding for five weeks.

"The new socialist Spanish government is making big efforts for the (former) state company Repsol to take over the oil resources in Equatorial Guinea," he said.

The Guinean dictator, President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, has had Mr Moto sentenced in absentia to 63 years for his alleged leadership of last year's plot.

"I have never known nor met Mr Thatcher, let alone agreed on a coup d'etat with him," said Mr Moto. "I don't need a putsch to come to power. But the Spanish government knows it won't rule my country when I become president, which is why it wants to solve [the problem] in any way."

He denied speculation that he was using Croatia as a base for recruiting mercenaries or buying arms to launch a fresh coup attempt.

It is not clear under whose auspices he is living in Zagreb.

Spanish foreign ministry officials were seeking confirmation of Mr Moto's whereabouts and thought it "good news" that he was alive, the Cadena Ser radio station reported.

Sources at his government in exile in Madrid asked for the Spanish government to find out what was happening. "If Severo had got himself into trouble, then we should assume the consequences," they told Europa Press news agency.

Despite reports that the Spanish government had launched an international search for Mr Moto, the Croatian interior ministry said it had received no Interpol request to look for him.

Since news of Mr Moto's presence in Croatia was reported, the Spanish embassy in Zagreb has refused to comment.

It may be that Mr Moto decided to go public in Zagreb as a form of insurance policy.

"I have avoided the worst. I am no longer afraid," he said. "If they killed me now, everyone would know who ordered the murder."