Feeding the hungry in Angola's central highlands continues to be impeded by the poor state of the runway in the provincial capital Kuito and escalating fighting, aid workers told IRIN.

The suspension of the independent Radio Ecclesia on July 9 and the arrest of reporter Gilberto Neto is one of several recent attacks on Angolan journalists. Freelance journalist Rafael Marques reports from Angola.

At least 70 people were killed and 15 wounded when armed men attacked the north Angolan diamond-mining town of Chinguvu, close to the Congo border, Lusa reported on Monday. Quoting an unnamed military source who identified the attackers as UNITA, the news agency said about 100 rebels were involved in the Saturday assault on a residential area of Chinguvu. A number of local residents were taken away by the attackers.

In a letter sent to today to Angolan president José Eduardo dos Santos, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) expressed deep concern about the murder of Alegria Gustavo, a journalist for the local branch of Rádio Nacional de Angola (RNA) in the central province of Huambo.

UNITA rebels on Wednesday announced the formation of five new teams designed to end their international isolation and to resolve the country's 26-year civil war, one of Africa's longest-running conflicts, Reuters reported on Wednesday. In a statement sent to Reuters in Johannesburg, UNITA said the co-ordinating commissions - covering political, administrative, judicial and military issues - were formed at the party's recent annual congress.

Cases of malnutrition in the Angolan central highland town of Kuito are rapidly increasing, reported on Thursday. SFP spokeswoman Cristina Muller said although aid flights to the town had resumed earlier this week, the poor condition of the airport runway was hindering the relief effort. At the same time, more and more people were arriving in the town, driven from their homes by Unita rebels and other armed groups, Muller was quoted as saying.

A French court has dropped its investigation into allegations that the son of the late President Francois Mitterrand was involved in illegal arms sales to Angola, BBC has reported.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP) was expected to meet Angolan government officials on Tuesday to discuss recent attacks on its cargo delivery planes. The meeting comes five days after the UN suspended all food delivery flights in the southern African country on Friday.

The refugee camp around Kuito, Angola is running out of food as more people arrive.

The Angolan government has dismissed as "nothing new" comments made on Wednesday by rebel leader Jonas Savimbi in a BBC interview. The ruling party's information secretary Norberto dos Santos told the Portuguese radio station RDP on Thursday that "what Angolans really want to know is when Savimbi is going to end the war".

The Organization of Angolan Women - OMA is the women's wing of the Popular Movement of the Liberation Angola (MPLA) and has over one and a half million members now. It represents the determination of the women of Angola. We started the "Pennies for Angola" campaign in response to the intense attacks against the Angolan people in 1999 by UNITA, a rebel organization attacking those (mainly women) who do the planting of food in the rural areas.

The Angolan government is to press ahead with elections next year despite the country's on-going civil war, Foreign Affairs Vice-Minister George Chicoti told IRIN on Thursday. "We will hold parliamentary and probably presidential elections next year, whatever the situation on the ground is," Chicoti said.

Twenty people were killed and 17 wounded when their vehicle hit an anti-tank mine in northern Angola, news reports said Friday. Two others died later in the hospital at Malange, about 190 miles east of the capital, Luanda, the Portuguese news agency Lusa said. The blast took place Thursday on a rural road about 25 miles north of Malange, according to Lusa.

Recent peace overtures by Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and UNITA rebel leader Jonas Savimbi have been matched on the battlefield by heightened military action across the country in recent months. Reports of UNITA and Angolan Armed Forces (FAA) attacks, retaliations and offensives have been constant and regular.

Amnesty International is concerned about the abduction of 60 children and two adults by UNITA and fear for their safety; unlawful killing. It calls for the immediate release of the children and the two adults abducted by UNITA; to publicize the plight of children as victims of armed conflict in Angola.

Sixty Angolan children abducted by UNITA forces earlier this month were freed on Friday, but an unknown number of juveniles remain captives within the rebel movement's ranks, humanitarian officials told IRIN. The children, along with two adults, were released at Camabatela in the northern province of Kwanza Norte. They had been abducted from an orphanage more than 300 km south run by the development agency ADPP, during an attack on the town of Caxito on 5 May.

UNITA has promised to search for and return about 60 children kidnapped by its soldiers during an attack on a children's home in Caxito, about 55 km outside the capital Luanda. Without accepting responsibility for the kidnappings, the rebel movement said in a communiqué released on Tuesday that "the UNITA General Staff has ordered a strict inquiry aimed at identifying children who might have been forced to accompany the Armed Forces for the Liberation of Angola (FALA) in the wake of the 5 May 2001 raid ... ". It said the children would be handed over the closest Catholic mission if they were found.

WFP has distributed 15 days' worth of emergency rations to about 3,000 people who fled Caxito in Bengo province after a UNITA attack on 5 May. The Cacuaco municipal authority, just outside the capital Luanda, resettled about 2,500 internally displaced persons (IDPs) from Caxito on four hectares of land in Bairro Caop Velho, Funda, WFP said in its latest situation report.

More than five children are dying each day from malnutrition in the city of Camapuca in Angola's central Bie province. "We are really shocked by the level of malnutrition that we are discovering in Camacupa. We are doing as much as we can to reduce mortality through our feeding centres, but this is not enough. People need urgently a general food distribution," Erwin Van der Borght, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) head of mission in Angola, said in a statement on Wednesday.

Encouraging signs are beginning to emerge that the Angolan government and UNITA rebels are inching towards dialogue to end nearly three decades of civil war, analysts and politicians told IRIN. "One or two years back the reaction from the government to the idea of peace through dialogue was very aggressive," said John Rocha of the reconciliation lobby group Angola-2000. "Today it has changed dramatically. The government has realised that a military victory is impossible, especially as UNITA has reverted to guerrilla warfare."