US lifts sanctions on Unita

Unita's 'black cock' flag from the civil war

The US has symbolically lifted sanctions against Angola's Unita movement, the former rebel group that has become a political party since the end of the civil war.

"Unita no longer poses an unusual and extraordinary threat to the foreign policy of the United States," White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Wednesday.

The lifting of sanctions, imposed by former US President Bill Clinton between 1993 and 1998, will allow Unita to conduct business with US financial organisations.

In a statement to the US Congress, President George W Bush said the sanctions would have had a "prejudicial effect on the development of Unita as an opposition political party, and therefore, on democratization in Angola".

The US courted Angola, a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, and received its support for a resolution to authorise military action against Iraq.

The resolution was never put to the vote.

Sanctions over

The UN lifted its arms and oil embargo, introduced in 1993, in December.

The 25-year long civil war in the former Portuguese colony - which claimed almost one million lives - ended when Unita leader Jonas Savimbi was killed by Angola's army in February 2002.

On 4 April 2002 the government and Unita signed a peace deal.

The US sanctions against Unita included a ban on the sale on arms and prevented it from selling diamonds, which it mined and used to fund the conflict.

Arms sales to political parties are not allowed under US law and only the Angolan government is legally allowed to export diamonds.

The US and South Africa's apartheid regime both at times supported Unita both financially and militarily against the Marxist government of Angola during the civil war.