UNITA Anti-Communist Freedom Fighters Disarm, Surrender to Communist Angolan Government

Associated Press via The Washington Times ^ | April 4, 2002

[rightwing2]

April 4, 2002 Angola, UNITA ink peace deal

LUANDA, Angola, April 4 (UPI) -- The Angolan government and UNITA rebels signed a cease-fire deal Thursday, formally ending a 27-year civil war that killed nearly a million people. Army chief Gen. Armando da Cruz Neto and UNITA head Gen. Abreu Muengo Ukwachitembo "Kamorteiro" signed the deal at the country's National Assembly. "Peace has a price but it is a lesser price than the price of war," Kamorteiro said. Neto said peace in the country would "benefit ... Africa and the world as a whole." The accord comes following a preliminary cease-fire signed over the weekend. U.S., Russian and Portuguese ambassadors also initialed the accord. The countries were observers to the 1994 Lusaka peace accords, which collapsed four years later.

Addressing the National Assembly, U.N. Deputy Secretary-General for African Affairs Ibrahim Gambari said the world body was "glad to note now that peace is being given a chance in Angola." "War in Angola has gone for far too long and has (brought) unimaginable suffering to ... Angola," he said. "There should now be collective determination of the Angolan people that peace will come to this country to stay, forever." In an address to the nation Wednesday, President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who also was present at the formal signing, called the deal "the reunion on the great Angolan family." "The war in Angola is over and that peace is here to stay," he said. He urged Angolans to "forgive and forget" the civil war that began in 1975 and which claimed about a million lives.

The ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola or MPLA and UNITA rebels have been embroiled in a bitter rivalry since before the country's independence from Portugal in 1975. Following independence from Portugal after 500 years of colonial rule, UNITA and MPLA forces engaged in 16 years of fierce conflict that killed up to 300,000 people. The fighting ended temporarily with a 1992 peace deal that was supposed to lead to elections.

However, UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi, who was killed by government troops in late February, rejected the election results and the fighting resumed. The 1994 accord resulted in the deployment of U.N. peacekeepers to Angola but fighting continued and in 1999 the peacekeepers withdrew. The United States and South Africa supported UNITA in its battle against the MPLA. The MPLA was supported by Cuban ground forces and received military equipment from the former Soviet Union. The civil war has left the oil- and diamond-rich country devastated. According to U.N. estimates, more than a third of the Angolan population is homeless and depends on international agencies as a direct result of the war. The country also is regarded as among the world's least developed.

[rightwing2]

This is a truly sad ending to a heroic 27 year long fight against the Communists of Angola led by recently assasinated leader of the UNITA anti-Communist freedom fighter, Dr. Jonas Savimbi. UNITA was the last anti-Communist freedom fighter resistance group left in existance. Most of the rest like Mozambique and Namibia were wiped out by the Communists long ago. The Communist Angolan Army assasinated Dr. Savimbi in an ambush, brutally mutilating his body with 15 shots to his body only days prior to President Bush's scheduled meeting with the butcher of Luanda himself, Angolan President Dos Santos. Rather, then do the principled thing and refuse to meet with President Dos Santos while the blood on his hands from Savimbi's killing was still fresh, Bush went ahead and met with the Communist President of Angola as well as the Communist President of Mozambique, himself guilty of atrocities against his own people.

The Communist's assasination of Savimbi, a longtime ally of the United States in the war against Soviet Communism who had been deprived of the Presidency of Angola only by rampant electoral fraud in the UN-sponsored 1992 election was a slap in the face to Bush who had previously called for a peaceful resolution to the conflict. Nevertheless, during the meeting Bush and his aides did not even mention the assasination of Ronald Reagan's freedom fighter, much less protest it! Sadly, this is just one more example of Bush's policy of appeasement of Communists worldwide. Bush's continuation and in some cases acceleration of Bill Clinton's policy of rank appeasement of Communist China is an even more glaring example.

[rightwing2]

Freedom Fighter Memorial BUMP! This should add even more impetus to the planned establishment of a Memorial for the Victims of Communism which has strong bipartisan support.

[FreedominJesusChrist]

Ping!

[FreedominJesusChrist]

It is too bad that PNTR had strong bi-partisan support, all this did was give the Communists in China what they wanted without having to clean up their deplorable human rights record.

[weikel]

Its foolish to surrender to communist they will give you no quarter better dead then red.

[constitutiongirl]

Savimbi Bump.

There are those of us in the West that will remember your fight against the Communist insurgents and appreciate that you paid the ultimate price for your struggle.

[rightwing2]

Its foolish to surrender to communist they will give you no quarter better dead then red.

Well, to be honest the UNITA commanders saw the writing on the wall. After witnessing Bush's failure to even mention, let alone criticize Dos Santos and his Communist MPLA regime for assasinating their leader, a faithful US ally of some 27 years, the remaining UNITA leaders were so demoralized that they gave up the fight. They actually have a greater chance of surviving by surrendering now unconditionally, then being ambushed and assasinated by the militarily superior Communist Angolan MPLA later on.

To be fair to Bush, he is not the only President to betray our faithful anti-Communist allies to the Reds. Truman was the first President to do so when he betrayed the Chiang Kai Shek's Nationalist anti-Communist freedom fighters to Mao's Red Army back in the 1940s. Ever since, it has become a disturbing and maddening trend in US policy.

[backhoe]

Very sorry to see this.

[weikel]

Personally I would not surrender.

[Tacis]

My bet is that there will be some aging Cuban soldiers/spies/butchers going back to Angola to get revenge on some of the freedom fighters who made the Cubans look bad by holding them off for so many years. Fidelito has mellowed but, like a trapped rat, only gotten sneakier and nastier as his entire vision has proven to be garbage and, even worse, begala. Here's a chance for the Cuban animals to get even a little and I'm betting some try.

[DoughtyOne]

I can't think of a single issue where the UN has been on the right side.

[WALLACE212]

Bump for that

Choices in Life

1) Victory

2) Death

Well I'll be darned, nothing about surrender in there.

Molon Labe

[WALLACE212]

That isn't a coincidence. The UN is the bloodthirsty Molech that demands all things good and innocent be sacrificed in its blasphemous name.

[weikel]

Under some circumstances in war I'd definitely surrender but never to 1) Communist 2) Islamic Fundamentalist or slavers by any other name I would rather die then live under them and since they'd probably kill me anyway its much more honorable to go down fighting.

[DoughtyOne]

Well, that seems to be born out by it's actions.

[Shermy]

O - I - L

[lentulusgracchus]

Yeah, I think you're right.....Bush knows Chevron is lifting a lot of crude from Angola and Cabinda (an enclave of Angola further up the coast). And the NWO types don't care who you are or what your politics are -- just keep the product coming.

Assassinating Savimbi paid off big for the MPLA, didn't it? Who says crime doesn't pay, and that we don't honor terrorists?

[Shermy]

Oops! I forgot the natural gas in Angola. Lots of workings going on down there - Angola Energy Link

NATURAL GAS

Angola has estimated natural gas reserves of 1.6 trillion cubic feet (Tcf). New discoveries could push Angola's proven gas reserves to 9.5 Tcf, and possibly as high as 25 Tcf. The majority (approximately 85%) of gas produced in Angola is flared, the remainder is reinjected to aid in oil recovery and processed in the production of LPG. World Bank studies estimate that Angola accounts for 30% of the gas flared in Africa. The government is developing strategies to reduce gas flaring and increase commercial usage of natural gas. CABGOC has initiated two zero-flare fields, Nemba and Lomba, and plans to make Kuito the third.

ChevronTexaco and Sonangol have agreed to develop a LNG (liquefied natural gas) project that would convert natural gas from offshore oil fields to LNG for export. The facility will process natural gas from offshore Blocks 1, 2, 3, 4, 15, 16, 17, and 18. The facility, which will be located in Luanda adjacent to the existing refinery, will initially consist of one LNG train with a capacity to process 4 million tons per year of LNG. The site is sufficiently sized for the plant to expand to additional LNG trains. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2002, with the $2-billion LNG project in service by mid-2005. Sonangol and ChevronTexaco each initially held a 50% interest in the project, but it was announced in July 2001, that BP, ExxonMobil and TotalFinaElf were joining the consortium. The firms are the respective operators on Blocks 15, 17 and 18. ChevronTexaco will remain the LNG project's operator. The LNG project could spur the development of other gas-related projects including: gas-fired generation facilities in the Luanda area, industrial usage of gas as a fuel (plans call for the Luanda cement plant to convert to gas), and expanding the domestic market for LPG.

In the ol' days, they just burned off the oil-associated gas without a thought.

[Shermy]

Yep. See my link above.