Angolan oil plant was target

Press, 30 May 1985, Page 6

Angolan oil plant was target

NZPA-Reuter Lisbon A South African commando captured during a covert operation in Angola says that his mission was to destroy an oil complex, the official Angolan news agency, Angop, says. Captain Wynand Petrus du Toit was quoted as telling a news conference in Luanda, the Angolan capital, that he had commanded an abortive sabotage raid on May 21 against the Malongo oil complex in the northern Angolan province of Cabinda. The nine raiders were surprised by an Angolan patrol. Two were killed,

Captain du Toit was captured and the rest escaped.

South Africa has said that the men were on a mission to gather information about African National Congress and South West Africa People’s Organisation guerrillas. Captain du Toit, who was wounded in the action, was quoted as saying, “We weren’t looking for either S.W.A.P.O. or for A.N.C.” He said that he had previously taken part in operations by South African special forces in Angola and in a sabotage attack on an A.N.C. office in the Mozambican capital of Maputo in 1983.

Captain du Toit was quoted as saying that the sabotage team had carried propaganda material belonging to Angolan antiGovernment rebels, which would have been left behind to make the authorities believe the rebels had made the attack. A senior Angolan Government official told reporters earlier that the raid had been intended to obstruct relations between Angola and the United States.

Paulino Pinto Joao, director of the Information and Propaganda Department of the central committee of the ruling M.P.L.A.-Workers’ Party, was quoted by Angop

as saying that the attack could have been a serious blow to the economy. “It is also clear the Pretoria Government was trying to introduce a new obstacle in the relationship between Angola and the United States,” he said. Mr Pinto Joao said that the clash had come at a time when fresh talks were being prepared between South Africa, the United States, and Angola. It also coincided with negotiations in the United States to renew the contract of the United States company, Gulf Oil, with the Angolan State oil company, Sonangol, he said.