/ 2 October 2007

Five children die as mortar explodes in Angola

Five children were killed and another seriously injured in an Angolan central rural district when they tried to open a mortar shell left from the civil war, an official said on Tuesday. The children were playing in Dando village, near Nharea in Bie province, when they discovered the 81mm shell.

Five children were killed and another seriously injured in an Angolan central rural district when they tried to open a mortar shell left from the civil war, an official said on Tuesday.

The children were playing in Dando village, near Nharea in Bie province, when they discovered the 81mm shell. They tried to open it by hitting it with a hoe, which triggered a blast, local administrator Armando Ngaieta said, according to the official Angop news agency.

Five of them, aged between five and 12 years, died on the spot and the sixth was taken to a local clinic in Nharea, in the hope of being transferred to Bie central hospital.

Police officers have been deployed to the scene to search for more explosives, the agency said.

Peace returned to Angola in April 2002 after a 27-year civil war, but more than 10-million landmines are still believed to be scattered across the country.

Since the end of the war, the former Portuguese colony has demined 50 square kilometres of its territory and destroyed about two million explosives — especially landmines and anti-tank mines. — Sapa-AFP