Word: swapo
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...hostilities that have long festered in the mineral-rich territory of Namibia (South West Africa), nestled along the African continent's Atlantic coast between Angola and South Africa. After meetings in the Angolan capital of Luanda, militant Namibian nationalists of the South-West African People's Organization (SWAPO) agreed to go along with a peacemaking formula drawn up by five Western powers. The plan calls for ending the twelve-year-old guerrilla war in the territory by having the United Nations supervise progress toward independence, to be attained by the end of the year. If all goes according...
...Ambassador Andrew Young, who conceived the Namibian strategy early last year. McHenry has been shuttling between New York and seven African capitals for the past 15 months in an effort to persuade leaders of the so-called Front Line States (Angola, Zambia, Tanzania, Mozambique and Botswana) to talk SWAPO Leader Sam Nujoma into buying the plan. Angolan officials were particularly anxious for a resolution of the conflict. Their southern border area is scattered with Namibian refugee camps and SWAPO guerrilla bases; last May South Africa peppered the area with a series of bombing attacks in an attempt to wipe...
South Africa is called upon to phase down its troop presence of 15,000 to a token force of 1,500 over the next three months. These remaining forces will be withdrawn after elections, to be held later this year. At the same time, SWAPO has agreed that its armed forces will cease "all hostile acts." The agreement fails to resolve the issue of Walvis Bay, the deepwater harbor in Namibia that South Africa has been anxious to keep. Presumably, it will be the subject of further negotiations...
Savimbi is well armed and reasonably well financed. Help comes directly from South Africa, which considers UNITA a potential ally in its struggle against the South West African People's Organization (SWAPO), the Angola-based rebel group that seeks to take over Namibia. Ovimbundu refugees, as a result, are allowed into Namibia to escape the fighting, as are some UNITA guerrillas. One wounded fighter recently showed up at a South African border camp, where he accepted a field bandage for his leg and a meal of corn mash and gravy. Leaving for the combat zone, he cockily echoed a line...
...everybody's surprise, the South African government has accepted the plan. SWAPO, on the other hand, is calling for a conference to work out some remainng details. The Western plan, for instance, would leave Namibia's security in the hands of the present South African police force during the transition period and would not require a reduction of South African troops stationed in the north until a "meaningful cessation of violence" had taken place. The plan would also defer to the new government the problem of Walvis Bay, the big harbor that geographically is part of Namibia...