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South African Forces Seeking Ceasefire In .Namibian SATURDAY, Al'MST 28. 1S32-TKS CCCUSA TJi:rS-13 Conflict - ANJ The South African forces that laun ched a new offensive in Angola last month will be staying until a cease- i Tccamulctc. and more than I (X) insurgents were killed. . The current fighting is ' annarentlv ihe most in- fire in the Namibian con- flict is declared. That ac cording to the 1 South African commander , in Namibia. Major General Charles l.lovii, speaking to journalists in the- November by another in Namibian capital Win- mrsion even further nor tense since the houtn African invasion a year ago in which it claimed to have v killed - I .(XX) SWAPO guerrillas. That action was followed in , dhoek on August 12., y. The South African ac tion, which is being com pared to the Israeli inva sion of Lebanon by some observers. ; has put in question the future of ,Wesiern-led efforts to negotiate a Namibian settlement. In particular, 'tome Western diplomats .Hive suggested that the S5ped-up military ac ty could make Angola en more hesitant to agree to the withdrawal of the Cuban troops that have been stationed there since South Africa first invaded the country in 1975. . The U.S. has been try ing to negotiate such a withdrawal, which South Africa ,,' has made a precondition to its cooperation on the pro posed settlement. Angolan officials have rejected any linkage bet ween a Cuban .troop withdrawal and a South African pull-out from Namibia. Nevertheless, State Department sources said last week 'hat talks on the issue : 'veen the two govern iti.nts were continuing. According to reports from South Africa, the latest offensive began on June II. On July 16, the South African forces at tacked two suspected SWAPO bases at Evale and Ionde, 80 miles in side Angola, but found them deserted, Lloyd , said. On August 10, his troops clashed with SWAPO guerrillas fur ther north at :. thward. during which South Africa said 7) in surgents died. ; Unlike the .highly-T publicised Lebanese situation, the latest . fighting . . in. , Angola - received no notice, until Lloyd's briefing.; -The Angolans , complained about air attacks on the town of Cahaina on July 20 and 21 but said little else.; South Africa main tained its usual silence about military opera tions until 15 soldiers .died when a Puma; helicopter was shot down. Subsequently, more details of the fighting were released by both, sides. Lloyd disclosed that South Africa is us ing French-built Mirage Fl jet fighters in Angola to counter Soviet MIG 23s, which he said arc now based in southern Angola. It 'was the first time South Africa had confirmed Angolan charges, of Mirage overflights of its ter ritory. In a report filed from the southern Angolan town of Lubango, a cor respondent for Agence France Press reported that the South Africans were attempting to move north through Cunene Province toward the town of Mutale, which provides ; electricity of Lubango, the major town in the south. According to the head of military intelligence in southern Angola, AFP reported, South African motorized units that president Reagan have been stationed in PW.c.ed appeal last ,he Cunene region n si XgtrW? the invasion a year ago Y" "'mit mgin.. , m have been moving; nor- 5 f " Wily expect a call thward underiair cover? ,m V-8! office to provided bvV South Pretoria oiiUi.s one. h s AWcaiv Mirage fighters , J $ !hc cards , . ' The Angolans, thought' Murders Pose : recognizing South m ijttfc jp ct ' African air supcriorilv in e IM C VV Cpl . , , !T5iKF6r;;Rawlings ' SiSSXyMilitaryGovt.. to be protected by ami- tANj j0ltcd by' the aircraft missiles. ! grisly slaying of three In addition. Lubango f High Court justices early is defended jointly by i.,.. mnmh r.hnnnV t 4 I' J. V y . Angolan forces and by Cuban troops; who have their own installations there. - " ' ;' According to Angolan military sources, '. the South Africans arc being assisted in this offensive by units from the Angolan dissident move ment UNITA, which has' been aided and supplied bv South Africa since 1975. The UNITA forces arc said to be ambushing Angolan military con voys. Lloyd said his forces acted on the basis of 1n - formation contained in captured SWAPO documents calling for the assassination of political figures in Namibia and the stockpiling of weapons close to the Namibian border just before the anticipated cease-fire. SWAPO has called the documents fakes. In the view of U.S. of ficials, the offensive could either further com plicate a settlement or put additional pressure on Angola to com promise on the Cuban issue. It was similar mix ed feelings about Israel's Lebanese incursion that characterized the U.S. position in the early weeks of that crisis. But as one official com mented wryly, referring . .: - . : X .) 4 ... p"" l CM" V : TP !." ;' In I'. military-civilian govern ment is struggling with the task of regaining the confidence of a frighten ed middle class. ' ! Occurring against '-a backdrop of widely reported violence, by soldiers against civilians; the murders of Justices Cecilaa ' Korantcng Addow, F.P. Sarkodcc and K.A. Agyepong trig gered intense feeling in some quarters against the ruling Provisional National Defense Coun cil (PNDC). The justices, along with a fourth vic tim, the personnel direC-I tor of the parastataL Ghana Industrial Holding Corporation, had a reputation of being unsympathetic to PNDC chairman Jerry Rawl-, ings. Consequently the killings initially appeared to many to be the work of young soldiers - or other PNDC supporters with a thirst for revenge. Rawlings has strenuously denied any part , in the sordid case, which he said "goes against all the principles which this revolutionary process is designed to ad vance." But he and other PNDC officials worry that many Ghanaians, particularly the middle class, are convinced of government complicity or else believe that fur ther politically motivated . violence can now be ex pected as the' logical . . " f I I 1 t'l.KVKI.AND l)r. Frederick I). Ilolliday was named siiHriiitemlenl f the XO.IHM) stmkiii (let eland school system, which Is planned by financial dirfiiiilties and is under court ordered desegregation llolll dav, 56, was superintendent r schools in Plain field. N. .1. School hoard president Alva I . Bonda Is on his lefl.pOS I"010 Exiled South African Author Ruth First Killed By Letter Bomb do "citizens have come under scrutiny or have been punished for a variety of potential and genuine offenses since the coup and an at mosphere of class an tagonism prevails. The middle class has always relied on the army, as an instrument of state power, to defend the status quo, writes veteran political analyst Nil K. Bentsi-Enchill in West Africa. But follow ing the July murders, says Bentsi-Enchill, "the middle classes feel thef spectre of anarchic lawlessness they always see over the shoulder of progressive change." In order to allay some of these fears the PNDC has orchestrated a chorus of official and semi-official condemna tion of the murders. In addition to Rawlings' own. statements, the slay AN) The exiled South African author Ruth First was killed August 17 by a letter bomb sent to her office at Mozam bique's Eduardo Mondlane University, where she was Research Director for the Centre of African Studies. At least four people, in cluding Centre director Aquino de Braganaca, were injured in the ex plosion. On Tuesday afternoon Ruth First had a small meeting in her office at the university at Maputo, according to correspondent Joseph Hanlong. As she often did, she opened her mail during the meeting. She came across two iden tical letters, one address ed to her, the other to de Braganaca. She passed his letter to him, and he "'opened it, but it failed to go off. result-oLtbe revolution 4yHwerrepudiaeiaV.b .-When she ... opened These sentiments were nro-PNDC erouos such hers, however, there was WASHINGTON President Reagan talks with Liberian head of slate Samuel Doe before an Oval Office meeting. dpi Photo forcefully expressed last month by old-guard politician Victor Owusu, a leading contender for the presidency prior to the latest military coup. "The people of Ghana," said Owusu, "have wat ched with horror and amazement one brutal act after another com mitted with impunity by the very persons who are supposed to protect our security." In an emotional article written for West Africa magazine, the former editor . of Ghana's leading daily newspaper goes . even further. Elizabeth Ohene blames PNDC sympathizers for the murders and charges the government with a "cover-up." Although students and urban workers comprise the bulk of its political base, the PNDC . has wished to avoid an tagonizing Ghana's mid dle, class. The govern ment has been pro moting a mass mobiliza tion of citizens : in all walks of life, and Rawl ings has expressed the hope that all Ghanaians rich and poor would get behind the PNDC's national reconstruction cam paign. At the same time a good number of well-to- Subscribe Now PLEASE ENTER1 MY SUBSCRIPTION FOR... ( 1 1 year-812.48 (Out of State-812.00) ( j 2 years82.96 (Out of State-824.00) Mr. ' Mrs., Ms.. , : The Carolina Times Address. . State City ! ) Check or Money Order Enclosed"; ) Dill me within thirty days If you are a present nubucriber, plcnue give this card to a friend as the National Union of Ghanaian Students, the June 4th Movement, and the People's Solidarity Organization. Even the Workers' Defense Com mittee at the Ghana In dustrial Holding Cor poration, a group that might have felt an tagonism toward com pany personnel director Sam Acquah before his murder, issued a strong declaration mourning the event and praised the late Acquah for his rap port with the govern ment. In addition, the PNDC has recently set up a special five-person panel to oversee an in quiry into the murder case. It will include a retired judge, one member of the Bar Association (which has been bitterly critical of the authorities), a representative of the At torney General and two other appointees. Also in late July the PNDC announced a plan for new special courts designed to curb the ex cesses of undisicplined soldiers and of the Peo ple's Defense Commit tees, which Rawlings has recently accused of ''political witch-hunting" and harassment of civilians. The head of state himself will chair a National Defense Committee given the job of helping direct the local groups. Finally," the police in Accra ' have begun a 24-hour emergency call service to aid those in distress. : While officials hope that all of these measures generate some kind of positive psychological ef fect on the middle class, the PNDC is continuing with the substance of its program for populist, reform. Among the latest economic moves is a plan to establish one or more state companies to engage in bulk importa tion and export, a step that would cut deeply in to the profits of the two largest trading firms, the United African Com pany and the United Trading Company." a blast so powertui tnat rt killed her instantly and blew a large hole in the concrete wall of her of fice. The other people in the office at the time are all in the hospital with cuts and burns. The 57-year-old Ms. First, from the time she was a teenager, devoted most of her energies to opposing white rule in South Africa. In a biographic sketch in the book From Protest to Challenge, published by Stanford University's Hoover Institution Press, she is called "one of the best-known and ablest white champions of African rights." As both a student and an adult, she was an ac tive member of the South African Communist Par ty, the only non-racial political party in South Africa before its banning in 1950. She became associated with the African National Con gress as soon as that organization began ac cepting whites. Along with her at torney husband, Joe Slovo, Ms. First was one of 156 defendants in the famous Treason Trial, which lasted from 1956 to 1961 Eventually ac quitted, she was arrested again and held in solitary confinement in 1963. Upon her release from prison she left the coun try. Among the many books she wrote or co authored are The South African Connection: Western Investment in Apartheid (1972); 117 Day (1965). an account of her experiences in detention; and Olive Schreiner (1980). a biography of the early South African feminist. Most of her con siderable body of work has dealt with the effects of South' Africa's economic and political system on. the lives of black South Africans. After Mozambique's independence in 1975. Ms. First and Slovo returned to southern Africa. Her research at the university in Maputo at first dealt primarily with the political economy of Mozambi que, but last year she began to direct a group specilizing in tracking and analyzing events in all of southern Africa. Especially pleased with her work on Olive Schreiner, Ms. First the mother of three daughters told, Africa News? "I came to feminism through radical politics. Ann Scott, my co-author, came to radical politics through feminism. It was a stimulating collabora tion." Mozambican officials have blamed the death on South African secret agents: - 1 at 1 V ' May Your beautiful family prosper! Providing for a family today requires a variety of resources. Among those resources is a sound backing institution. Services such as trust famds savings accounts, savings certificates and a i variety of loan plans could keep your family's financial picture a happy one! Ask us about these services ... MECHANICS & FARMERS BANK UmbrFDIC VZJ
The Carolina Times (Durham, N.C.)
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Sept. 4, 1982, edition 1
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