UNITA soldiers give themselves up

UNITA soldiers in southern Angola have begun crossing the border to hand themselves over to the Namibian authorities, and are being transported to demobilisation sites back in Angola, The Namibian newspaper reported on Monday.

The newspaper said 70 former UNITA rebels who surrendered to the authorities in Rundu, northern Angola. Some appeared malnourished, and among them were child soldiers clothed in "rags and torn shoes", the report said. They where trucked back across the border last week.

The Namibian Defence Force (NDF) commander in the Kavango Region, Lt-Col Abed Mukumangeni, told The Namibian at the weekend that it took two weeks for the group to walk hundreds of kilometres from former UNITA strongholds in southern Angola to Namibia.

The rebels are slowly moving from their bush encampments on the northern bank of the Kuito river into Namibia. Poor communication means news of the 4 April ceasefire signed between the government and UNITA commanders is still filtering through.

"Some [UNITA] members have not been informed [about the demobilisation]. They are very scattered in the bush and it is very difficult for all of them to get the message at the same time," said Mukumangeni.

Hilda Carreira, the press attaché at the Angolan Embassy in Windhoek, was quoted as saying that since the ceasefire, more than 9,000 UNITA soldiers had entered 33 demobilisation areas across Angola.

Phil ya Nangoloh of the Namibian Society for Human Rights told IRIN that the end of the conflict in Angola could see a boost to the local economy in northern Namibia.

Cross border raids by UNITA in retaliation for Windhoek's political and military support to the Angolan government had sewn insecurity across the region. The tourism industry had been particularly hard hit.

"People have been stepping on landmines," ya Nangoloh said. "I hope the lodges along the Kavango river can now reopen, we really welcome this opportunity."

In further confirmation of Namibia's military role in Angola's civil war, Mukumangeni was quoted as saying that over 1,200 NDF soldiers deployed inside Angola had harried UNITA across the southern province of Cuando Cubango to deny them food. The government had earlier insisted that the NDF only crossed into Angola on hot-pursuit operations.

"We hope the conflict has now ended and we can now look to make this peace workable and permanent," ya Nangoloh said. "But it is bound to fail if it doesn't address the root causes of why this conflict came about."