Portugal has offered to support Mozambique in organising logistics and building the capacity of its military to deal with Islamist insurgents threatening stability in the gas-rich northern province of Cabo Delgado.

The militants last month turned a football pitch in a village into an "execution ground", where they decapitated and chopped bodies, according to reports.

Portuguese Defence Minister, Joao Gomes Cravinho, said a team of Portuguese military personnel will from next month start working with their Mozambican counterparts.

Mr Gomes Cravinho over the weekend ended a three-day working visit to the southern Africa country.

He said that Portugal, which assumes the presidency of the European Union in 2021, would seek to reinforce Mozambique's request for support that was already made to Brussels.

The violence in Cabo Delgado province is causing a humanitarian crisis, with more than 2,000 people killed and 560,000 others displaced.