Please wait. Contacting image service... loading

Article text

fUlORlD nEUIS)
MILITARY ATTACKS
S. Africa 'killed
1,800 Angolans'
LISBON, Friday (AAP-Reutcr).
- President <!os Santos of Angola
accused South Africa yesterday of
killing 1,800 people and causing
damage estimated at $A5,900 mil
lion in military attacks against
Angolan territory during the past
three years.
The official news agency Angop
quoted Mr dos Santos as saying that the
South African armed forces flew 290
bombing missions over Angola, staged
70 overland incursions and made 50
landings of helicopter-borne troops in
that period.
Mr dos Santos said more, than 1,800
civilians and military personnel had
died and more than 3,000 were
wounded as a result of the raids.
Thousands of cattle had been
slaughtered, and schools and hospitals
destroyed in a vast»area of southern and
central Angola. . .
Mr dos Santos accused South Africa
of destabilising his country, but praised
guerillas opposed to South Africa.
He specifically referred to a raid on
South Africa's Sasol oil-from-coal plant
earlier this year by what he described
, as members of the banned African
National Council, saying such acts had
shaken the white Government's founda
tions.
Despite South Africa's military pres
sure, his Government w^ould continue to
support the South-West Africa People's
Organisation fighting for the independ
ence of Namibia.
The reports accused the US of sup
porting anti-governrrient Angolan
movements, and blamed its "militarist
policies" for the lack of normal
diplomatic relations between the two
countries. It reaffirmed Angola's com
mitment to the Soviet bloc and African
liberation movements.
. His party would make Angola the
bulwark of socialism in Africa and
would continue to follow the principle
of proletarian internationalism in its
relations with the rest of the world.
$