UN calls for transparent and accountable government

Despite significant progress towards lasting peace in Angola, the country still faced major security and humanitarian challenges, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a new report to the Security Council. Annan said with Angola now enjoying "real prospects for peace", the international community must take steps to consolidate progress and foster reconstruction. The report underscored concerns about the living conditions in 42 reception centres holding 80,000 former rebel UNITA fighters and 350,000 family members. Concerns persist that "demobilised ex-combatants, without means of support, may resort to banditry and theft," the Secretary-General cautioned, adding that the government's unorganised and ill-financed resettlement effort has been "a source of tension". Moreover, Annan stressed the importance of disarming all civilians. "Disarmament of the civilian population remains central to the overall enhancement and consolidation of peace and security ... The concerns over this issue reflect a continuing trend of insecurity in some of the provincial and urban areas, where banditry has increased significantly." The Secretary-General recommended that supporting the electoral process - with national elections now scheduled for 2004 - curbing corruption, and providing guarantees of basic freedom and human rights were crucial to the country's stability. Although, the humanitarian community would continue to support recovery efforts, Annan called on the government to establish "transparent" and "accountable" governmental institutions. Meanwhile on Wednesday, Ibrahim Gambari, the UN Secretary-General's Representative to Angola, told the Security Council that humanitarian activities had expanded dramatically in the country since the end of the war. Some notable progress had included the delivery since June of food, health care, water and sanitation to more than 1 million people. Gambari noted that the Consolidated Inter-Agency Appeal for 2003, requiring US $384 million to assist the government, was probably the last appeal for Angola. "Technical assistance should also be provided for the forthcoming 2004 national elections, and efforts to help address the humanitarian situation and build human rights capacity and awareness must be intensified," Gambari said. Earlier this year, Angola recorded a drop in the percentage of people suffering from life-threatening shortfalls of food and medicine, but since the return to areas of origin of more than 700,000 internally displaced people, malnutrition levels have since increased. Last week, citing progress in the peace process, the Security Council voted unanimously to lift the sanctions it had imposed on UNITA over the last nine years of the war.