By Anthony Goodman
United Nations - The situation in Angola was ``reaching a critical watershed,'' mainly because of the failure of former UNITA rebels to fulfil the terms of a 1994 peace accord, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said on Friday. In a report to the Security Council, he said if this continued, U.N. involvement in Angola would have to be reviewed. Annan said if U.N. demands were implemented, he would recommend a two-month renewal, until August 31, of the U.N.
Observer Mission in Angola (MONUA) comprising nearly 1,200 troops, military observers and police. The current two-month mandate of the U.N. operation, which at its height numbered more than 7,000, expires June 30. But if it ``should become clear that there is no political will to complete the peace process expeditiously,'' Annan said he intended resuming the withdrawal of U.N. troops and halting the planned deployment of additional police. ``It would also become necessary in such a situation to review the United Nations involvement in Angola.''
The Security Council adopted a resolution last week imposing new sanctions on UNITA from June 25 if by June 23 it failed to implement remaining requirements of the 1994 peace accord signed in Lusaka, Zambia. The accord was to end nearly two decades of civil war that followed independence from Portugal in 1975.
UNITA has, among other things, failed to hand over several regions of the country that it controls to a national unity government in which it shares power and has not completed the demobilization of its fighters. The threatened sanctions, which supplement previously imposed travel curbs and an oil and arms embargo, include a freeze on the bank accounts of UNITA, its leaders and members of their families, and a ban on its lucrative diamond trade.
``Since my last report, the situation in Angola has continued to deteriorate quickly and has become critical,'' Annan said. It was clear that ``this deterioration is attributable, for the most part, to the failure of UNITA to fulfil its obligations'' under the peace agreement and to carry out a plan which the U.N. special representative for Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye, offered to UNITA and the government of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos on May 15. Annan also said some recent statements reported to have been made by UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi ``can only increase the very serious concern of the international community, which I share.''
One example he cited was a statement June 6 in which Savimbi was reported to have told his supporters that additional sanctions would be considered an attack against UNITA, to which it should be ``ready to respond.'' ``It is clear that developments in Angola are reaching a critical watershed,'' Annan said, while hoping that adoption of the sanctions resolution ``will encourage the UNITA leadership to take the decisive last steps'' to complete the peace process. ``Clearly these steps would be in UNITA's best interests and would open the door to its full participation in the future political life of Angola. To do otherwise would deny Angola another opportunity to attain the lasting peace which its long-suffering people so deserve,'' he said.
