wfn.org | Internally Displaced Persons Killed in Rebel Attack on Angolan Town

["Frank Imhoff" <franki@elca.org>]

LWF Representative: Security is 'More Precarious than Expected'

LUANDA, Angola/GENEVA, 10 May 2001, (LWI) - Around 200 internally displaced
persons (IDPs) are feared dead following what is believed to be a National
Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) attack on Caxito town,
some 50 km north of the Angolan capital Luanda.

According to Carl von Seth, the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Department
for World Service (DWS) representative in Angola, the first IDPs were
silently knifed to death in the dark by UNITA men dressed up in army
uniforms."

Caxito, the capital of the northern province of Bengo, was attacked from
three sides. When commotion started, fire was opened accompanied by mortar
shelling and fighting broke out at three places. At the time of sending out
this article, there was no official confirmation on the number of
casualties.

On May 5 the fighting was over, UNITA troops had withdrawn but Caxito and
surrounding villages were empty. The LWF representative said over 100,000
had fled the town.

The attack "shows that the security situation, even in the close vicinity of
Luanda is more precarious than expected," said von Seth. The motive was
considered political, especially in view of the arrival the following day of
Mr. Ibrahim Gambari, the UN Special Adviser on Africa, focusing on Angola,
Southern Africa and Central Africa, including the Great Lakes region.

An assessment mission comprising the LWF, United Nations Coordination Office
for Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), UN World Food Program (WFP), UN High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Doctors Without Borders (MSF) - Swiss and
British charity Oxfam concluded that that there is an urgent need to review
the security situation, particularly concerning the return of IDPs to a camp
in Caxito.

Under an agreement with OCHA and the European Community Humanitarian Office
(ECHO), the LWF will be responsible for the provision of non-food relief
items in six provinces, among them Bengo.

A Danish organization, Development Aid People to People (ADPP) was among
NGOs that were severely affected. During the attack two of its teachers were
killed, another teacher and 61 pupils were abducted and 120 children are
unaccounted for. "This is a particularly nasty feature of UNITA warfare
since the children are forced to become soldiers," said the LWF
representative.

An Italian NGO, the Committee for the Coordination of Volunteering
Organizations (COSV) lost a doctor who was killed when he tried to flee. A
German NGO Hungerhilfe that has big agricultural projects in Caxito escaped
attack. Although some parts of the town were burnt, some NGO and UN
warehouses remained intact with a substantial amount of food.

The LWF/DWS program has contributed to the resettlement of more than 20,000
IDPs to arable land outside the cities. The country program, in Angola since
1987, focuses on providing assistance in relief, rehabilitation and
development, working with identified partners and communities in selected
areas.

Civil war has ravaged Angola since independence from Portugal in 1975.
Notwithstanding the 1994 peace accord between the government and UNITA
serious fighting resumed in 1998 rendering hundreds of thousands of people
homeless. It is estimated that up to 1.5 million lives may have been lost in
the war over the past 25 years.

(The LWF is a global communion of Christian churches in the Lutheran
tradition. Founded in 1947 in Lund (Sweden), the LWF now has 131 member
churches in 72 countries representing over 60.2 million of the nearly 64
million Lutherans worldwide. The LWF acts on behalf of its member churches
in areas of common interest such as ecumenical relations, theology,
humanitarian assistance, human rights, communication, and the various
aspects of mission and development work. Its secretariat is located in
Geneva, Switzerland.)

[Lutheran World Information (LWI) is the information service of the Lutheran
World Federation (LWF). Unless specifically noted, material presented does
not represent positions or opinions of the LWF or of its various units.
Where the dateline of an article contains the notation (LWI), the material
may be freely reproduced with acknowledgement.]

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