Neto nets 400, reports say

Press, 5 November 1977, Page 8

Neto nets 400, reports say

NZPA-Reuter Lisbon Travellers from Angola said yesterday that the Marxist Government of President Agostinho Neto had detained more than 400 dissidents during the past ’three weeks in the cities of Luanda and Huambo. A large number of civil servants were reported to be imprisoned in Huambo, the central region administrative centre in the former Portuguese colony. They had been arrested on the ground that they were secret sympathisers of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, a pro-West guerrilla group opposed to Mr Neto that, controls large areas of central and southern Angola. Those detained in Luanda, Angola’s capital, were said to be largely students and other young people not connected with the national union. The travellers said the wave of seizures, apparently timed to coincide with a congress of the ruling Popular Movement for the Liber-

ation of Angola, was continuing yesterday. They said their information was based largely on private contacts in Angola, since officials have generally declined to comment. The reports could not be confirmed in Lisbon, but they came from sources who have proved reliable in the past. The travellers said continuing discontent in Angola was caused partly by difficult living conditions. Food w'as reported to be in short supply. Luanda remained under curfew, and travel was restricted between the capital and provincial centres, they said.