UNITA kills eight soldiers - claim

Eight Namibian soldiers were shot and killed last month, allegedly by rebels fighting to overthrow the Angolan government, Namibia's National Society for Human Rights said on Thursday. AP reported that citing military sources, the society said the soldiers had been killed on 21 July near Licua, an Angolan town about 150 km northeast of Namibia's border with Angola.

"The surviving soldiers in the unit had no choice but to carry the dead and injured soldiers for seven days to a place where they could be picked up by helicopter," Phil ya Nangoloh, the society's executive director, was quoted saying. "Choppers could apparently not pick them up earlier as they came under heavy fire."

According to the report, the Namibian defense ministry declined to comment on the society's claim. The Namibian government is an ally of the Angolan government which has been waging war against Jonas Savimbi's UNITA rebels for almost three decades. Last month the defense ministry denied claims by UNITA that rebels had killed 10 Namibian soldiers in southern Angola. It was unclear whether the human rights group was referring to the same soldiers as UNITA, the report said.