Related Research Articles
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola, is a country located on the west coast of Southern Africa. It is the second-largest lusophone (Portuguese-speaking) country in both total area and population, and it is the seventh-largest country in Africa, bordered by Namibia to the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the north, Zambia to the east, and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. Angola has an exclave province, the province of Cabinda that borders the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The capital and largest city is Luanda.
The economy of Angola remains heavily influenced by the effects of four decades of conflict in the last part of the 20th Century, the war for independence from Portugal (1961–75) and the subsequent civil war (1975–2002). Despite extensive oil and gas resources, diamonds, hydroelectric potential, and rich agricultural land, Angola remains poor, and a third of the population relies on subsistence agriculture. Since 2002, when the 27-year civil war ended, government policy prioritized the repair and improvement of infrastructure and strengthening of political and social institutions. During the first decade of the 21st Century, Angola was one of the fastest-growing in the world, with reported annual average GDP growth of 11.1 percent from 2001 to 2010. High international oil prices and rising oil production contributed to strong economic growth, although with high inequality, at that time. Corruption is rife throughout the economy and the country remains heavily dependent on the oil sector, which in 2017 accounted for over 90 percent of exports by value and 64 percent of government revenue. With the end of the oil boom, from 2015 Angola entered into a period of economic contraction.
Angola is a country in southwestern Africa. The country's name derives from the Kimbundu word for king. It was first settled by San hunter-gatherer societies before the northern domains came under the rule of Bantu states such as Kongo and Ndongo. From the 15th century, Portuguese colonists began trading, and a settlement was established at Luanda during the 16th century. Portugal annexed territories in the region which were ruled as a colony from 1655, and Angola was incorporated as an overseas province of Portugal in 1951. After the Angolan War of Independence, which ended in 1974 with an army mutiny and leftist coup in Lisbon, Angola achieved independence in 1975 through the Alvor Agreement. A few months before independence, Angola entered a period of civil war that lasted until 2002.
The People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola, for some years called the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola – Labour Party, is a left-wing political party that has ruled Angola since the country's independence from Portugal in 1975. The MPLA fought against the Portuguese army in the Angolan War of Independence from 1961 to 1974, and defeated the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) and the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA), two other anti-colonial movements, in the Angolan Civil War of 1975–2002.
The Angolan Civil War was a civil war in Angola, beginning in 1975 and continuing, with interludes, until 2002. The war began immediately after Angola became independent from Portugal in November 1975. The war was a power struggle between two former anti-colonial guerrilla movements, the communist People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) and the anti-communist National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). The war was used as a surrogate battleground for the Cold War by rival states such as the Soviet Union, Cuba, South Africa and the United States.
Rafael Marques de Morais is an Angolan journalist and anti-corruption activist who received several international awards for his reporting on conflict diamonds and government corruption in Angola. He currently heads the anti-corruption watchdog Maka Angola.
Global Witness is an international NGO established in 1993 that works to break the links between natural resource exploitation, conflict, poverty, corruption, and human rights abuses worldwide. The organisation has offices in London and Washington, D.C. Global Witness states that it does not have any political affiliation. Gillian Caldwell joined the organisation as executive director in July 2015 and Mark Stephens was appointed Chair in March 2016. In February 2020, Mike Davis became CEO of Global Witness.
After adaptation of Constitution of the Republic of Azerbaijan (1995), new legislative acts and amendments were issued in line with democratic principles and in consistency with requirements of international law within the legal reforms in Azerbaijan. Generally, there are 48 Articles regarding principal human and Civil Rights and Freedoms in the Constitution of Azerbaijan. In particular, section 3 of the Constitution establishes the major rights and freedoms of citizens of Azerbaijan, including human rights, property rights, equality rights, intellectual property rights, civil rights, the rights of the accused, the right to strike, social security, the right to vote and freedom of speech, conscience and thought.
Angola – United States relations are diplomatic relations between the Republic of Angola and the United States of America. These relations were tense during the Angolan Civil War when the U.S. government backed National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) rebels, but have warmed since the Angolan government renounced Communism in 1992.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights in Angola have seen improvements in the early half of the twenty-first century. In November 2020 the National Assembly approved a new penal code, which legalised consenting same-sex sexual activity. Additionally, employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation has been banned, making Angola one of the few African countries to have such protections for LGBT people.
Angola has long been severely criticized for its human rights record. A 2012 report by the U.S. Department of State said, "The three most important human rights abuses [in 2012] were official corruption and impunity; limits on the freedoms of assembly, association, speech, and press; and cruel and excessive punishment, including reported cases of torture and beatings as well as unlawful killings by police and other security personnel. Other human rights abuses included: harsh and potentially life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; lengthy pretrial detention; impunity for human rights abusers; lack of judicial process and judicial inefficiency; infringements on citizens' privacy rights and forced evictions without compensation; restrictions on nongovernmental organizations; discrimination and violence against women; abuse of children; trafficking in persons; discrimination against persons with disabilities, indigenous people, and persons with HIV/AIDS; limits on workers' rights; and forced labor."
Franco-Angolan relations are foreign relations between France and Angola. Relations between the two countries have not always been cordial, due to the former French government's policy of supporting militant separatists in Angola's Cabinda province. The international Angolagate scandal embarrassed both governments, by exposing corruption and illicit arms deals. Following French President Nicolas Sarkozy's visit in 2008, relations have improved.
Slavery in Angola existed since the late 15th century when Portugal established contacts with the peoples living in what is the Northwest of the present country, and founded several trade posts on the coast. A number of those peoples, like the Imbangala and the Mbundu, were active slave traders for centuries. In the late 16th century, Kingdom of Portugal's explorers founded the fortified settlement of Luanda, and later on minor trade posts and forts on the Kwanza River as well as on the Atlantic coast southwards until Benguela. The main component of their trading activities consisted in a heavy involvement in the Atlantic slave trade. Slave trafficking was abolished in 1836 by the Portuguese authorities.
The 30-year civil war and 20 years of Soviet command economy left Angola in ruins and produced a centralized government with authoritarian tendencies that has made possible the ownership of the nation's resources by the president and his associates. They have used the government apparatus to allow themselves and their patronage networks a variety of legal and extra-legal options to extract private profit from Angola's economy.
Telecommunications in Angola include telephone, radio, television, and the Internet. The government controls all broadcast media with a nationwide reach.
Ou Virak is a Cambodian public intellectual and human rights activist, currently serving as the President of Future Forum, a think tank dedicated to public policy issues. He is also the founder of the Alliance for Freedom of Expression in Cambodia (AFEC), and winner of the Reebok Human Rights Award for his civil society campaign for freedom of expression and for the release of human rights advocates imprisoned for criticizing the Cambodian government.
The 2011 Malawi protests were protests aimed at winning political and economic reforms or concessions from the government of Malawi. On 20 July, Malawian organisations protested against perceived poor economic management and poor governance by President Bingu wa Mutharika and his Democratic Progressive Party. After the first two days of protests, 18 deaths, 98 serious injuries and 275 arrests had been reported. Further demonstrations were organised on 17 August and 21 September The first protest was later cancelled due to the intervention of a UN representative in initiating a dialogue; however, the talks broke down with more protests planned for Red Wednesday through a national vigil.
Chan Kin-man is a former associate professor of Sociology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He is one of the founders of the Occupy Central with Love and Peace campaign that strove for universal suffrage for the Hong Kong Chief Executive Election in 2017.
Suʽad al-ʽAli was an Iraqi human rights campaigner. She was the president of al-Wid al-Alami For Human Rights. She was murdered in the city of Basra, Iraq, on September 25, 2018.
Squatting in Angola occurs when displaced peoples occupy informal settlements in coastal cities such as the capital Luanda. The Government of Angola has been criticized by human rights groups for forcibly evicting squatters and not resettling them.