Humanitarian impact of government offensive

As the Angolan government continues with a military offensive against UNITA rebels in the east of the country, the UN Secretary-General's Special Adviser for Africa has arrived for a series of meetings to determine how the international community can help re-energise the moribund Angolan peace process. During his week-long visit - which began on 8 December - Ibrahim Gambari planned to hold consultations with government leaders, politicians and representatives of civil society, a UN spokesman said. On his return to New York, Gambari is expected to brief the UN Security Council. However, in a sign of the government's continued military operations against Jonas Savimbi's rebel forces, the Angolan Armed Forces (FAA) on 7 December paraded the former chief of Savimbi's personal guard in the Moxico provincial capital of Luena. The authorities said Brigadier Luis Ndimba was recently captured in combat. Last week, Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos stressed that the military campaign was beginning to "pacify" parts of the country. "There are zones where stability is evident, in which circulation is done much more frequently and where rehabilitation and construction works were also intensified," state media reported him as saying. "All those forces which for some time created obstacles to the normalisation of life, are increasingly having less capacity to do so". In its latest update, the World Food Programme (WFP) described the security situation in Angola as "tense", with a steady movement of internally displaced people (IDPs) into urban centres. The UN food agency said in its 3-10 December report that the humanitarian and nutritional situation had deteriorated in the central province of Bie and the southwestern province of Huila due to the high number of IDPs arriving in municipal centres. The agency said the movements were "allegedly as a result of intensified military activity". The report said: "This was particularly the case in Bie province, where troop movements were reported east of the provincial capital Kuito. In Bie province, 90 percent of the IDPs who arrived in Kuito and Camacupa are said to come from Chicala and Cambandua towns, both located to the east of the provincial capital (Kuito)." WFP said it distributed a total of 406 mt of maize, maize meal, pulses, oil, sugar, salt and dry fish to about 32,300 beneficiaries in the Kuito/Camacupa corridor during the reporting week. FAA and UNITA have been engaged in battle in Bie, neighbouring Moxico, and Cuando Cubango to the south in recent months, with the government making what many believe is a full-blooded effort to rout the rebels. Angola's peasants have borne the brunt of the war, which has lasted almost three decades. New IDPs arriving in some centres in Huila showed an acute global malnutrition rate of 24.7 percent as aid agencies battled to deal with the increasing numbers, the report said. "Malnutrition rates are reportedly on the rise among newly arrived IDPs in Huila province in the towns of Matala, Cacula and Hoque especially, and WFP is identifying nutritional interventions with partners," it added. According to WFP, Malanje remained calm last week, with the provincial government starting to fly municipal administration staff to the towns of Kambundi, Katembo, Cahombo and Marimba. Some items like soap, vegetable oil and salt were also being flown into these towns by helicopter for trading purposes. But instability in the northern province of Uige prevented food deliveries to the city during the reporting week. A humanitarian source told IRIN on Wednesday that Uige city was on full alert. The city, seen as a strategic through-route to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for refugees and UNITA fighters alike, has been attacked by UNITA rebels at least three times since June. The source said that gunfire was being heard around the city at night. WFP said in its report that the Negage airport, about 25 km from Uige city, had been closed due to the precarious condition of the runway, but did not mention security concerns. Meanwhile, UNHCR has warned that the conflict in Angola continues to drive new flows of refugees into Zambia. Since the beginning of December, a total of 1,184 Angolan refugees have crossed into Zambia's Western Province, UNHCR spokesman Rupert Colville told reporters in Geneva. The new arrivals are being transferred to Nangweshi camp, in southwest Zambia, on a temporary basis. There, they are housed at a transit site outside the main camp. In the last three months, an estimated 6,700 Angolan refugees have arrived at Nangweshi and are being assisted at the temporary site. Transfers from the border are organised daily. African Humanitarian Action, UNHCR's implementing partner for the health sector at Nangweshi, immunises the new arrivals against tuberculosis, measles, polio and other communicable diseases before they are taken to the temporary site. Angolans now total 214,524, out of the 274,000 refugees currently hosted by Zambia, UNHCR said.