Lisbon | Tuesday
ANGOLAN rebels from the Union for the Total Independence of Angola (Unita) said on Monday they were responsible for a deadly ambush last week of a passenger train east of Luanda that killed more than 150 people.
A Unita statement released in Portugal, Angola’s former colonial power, said at least 152 people died in the attack last Friday and another 151 were injured.
The group said the blast from an anti-tank mine laid on the rails caused the train to derail and rebels moved in to target the passengers.
Unita also said it killed the 25 soldiers and 11 police escorting the train, and claimed the convoy had been transporting fuel, ammunition, equipment and food to an army base.
Angola’s government newspaper, Jornal de Angola, reported Monday that more than 100 people died when a train struck an anti-tank mine in Cuanza Norte province, east of the Angolan capital.
It said rebels had fired on passengers trying to extricate themselves from the train’s carriages after it derailed and had killed some.
State radio reported that a commission of enquiry was at the scene, and said it was possible that the toll could rise. It said 140 people had been injured.
The train, carrying some 500 passengers, consisted of four passenger cars, two freight cars and two oil containers.
It was travelling between Luanda and Dondo when the incident occurred.
Meantime, Interior Minister Fernando Dias dos Santos vowed that attacks by rebels will not force a postponement of next year’s elections in Angola, Portugal’s Lusa news agency reported.
It said the minister spoke to the press in the Angolan capital of Luanda after a meeting with an American delegation studying preparations for the scheduled presidential and legislative elections in 2002.
“All current violent action is Jonas Savimbi’s political error,” the interior minister said. “It is the government’s job to ensure order and security for the Angolan people, and these actions will not last long.
“It is not with violence of this kind that (Savimbi) is going to prevent the elections from taking place next year.”
The 26-year-old civil war between government forces and Unita has left an estimated 500 000 dead, another 100 000 mutilated, and four million people displaced out of a population of 12-million. – AFP ZA*NOW:
Warring parties forsake Angolan people, say doctors July 4, 2001
Unita attacks defy progress on peace May 14, 2001