Summary

Signatory Angola has pledged to ratify the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but its ratification has yet to be presented to parliament for consideration and approval. Angola has participated in all of the convention’s meetings. It has voted in favor of the annual United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution promoting the convention since 2015.

Angola stated in September 2017 that it does not possess any stocks of cluster munitions and commented on past use. Angola is not known to have produced or exported cluster munitions.

Policy

The Republic of Angola signed the Convention on Cluster Munitions on 3 December 2008.

For more than a decade, Angolan representatives have promised that the government will ratify the convention, but the ratification request has not yet been presented to parliament for consideration and approval.[1] Angola last provided an update on its ratification status in 2017.

Existing legislation, such as the constitution and Penal Code, ensures Angola’s implementation of the convention’s provisions. In September 2017, Angola stated that it regards existing laws and regulations as “sufficient to charge, prosecute and punish any national or foreign citizen who in the Angolan Territory develop, produce, acquire, stockpile, retain or transfer to anyone directly or indirectly, assist, encourage or induce anyone to engage in any activity prohibited under the Convention of Cluster Munitions.”[2]

Angola has not submitted a voluntary Article 7 transparency report detailing the actions it is taking to implement and adhere to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.[3]

Angola participated extensively in the Oslo Process that created the Convention on Cluster Munitions. It did not attend the formal negotiations in Dublin in May 2008, but signed the convention in Oslo in December 2008.[4]

Angola participated in the convention’s Second Review Conference in November 2020 and September 2021, as well as intersessional meetings held in May 2022. It has attended every Meeting of States Parties of the convention, as well as its First Review Conference in 2015. Angola has participated in regional workshops on the convention, most recently in Abuja, Nigeria in March 2022.[5]

In December 2021, Angola voted in favor of a UNGA resolution that urged states outside the Convention on Cluster Munitions to “join as soon as possible.”[6] Algeria has not condemned use of cluster munitions in Ukraine or other recent conflicts.

Angola is a State Party to the Mine Ban Treaty. It is not party to the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW).

Production, transfer, and stockpiling

Angola is not known to have produced or exported cluster munitions.

In September 2017, Angola told States Parties that it does not possess any cluster munitions as its stockpile was destroyed by 2012. It said that disposal teams from the Angolan Armed Forces and the HALO Trust destroyed a total of 7,284 submunitions from stocks in 2005–2012.[7] According to Angola’s statement, officials from the highest ranks of the Angolan Army and Ministry of Defense confirmed the country no longer possesses cluster munitions.

Angola still must provide a transparency report for the convention to formally confirm that all its cluster munition stocks have been destroyed.

According to a major arms reference publication, Angola purchased four 220mm Uragan multi-barrel rocket launchers from Belarus in 2018.[8] The Uragan launcher can fire different types of rockets including those with 9N210 and 9N235 explosive submunitions. Angola must declare whether it acquired 9M27K-series cluster munition rockets as part of this purchase.

Use

Deminers have cleared unexploded submunitions and other remnants of air-delivered cluster munitions from at least eight of Angola’s 18 provinces, mostly in the south and southeast.[9] However, a lack of firm evidence means that it is not possible to conclusively attribute exact responsibility for the past use of cluster munitions during fighting between government forces and National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (União Nacional para a Independência Total, UNITA) rebels from 1975–2000.

In 2017, Angola told States Parties that there was “very limited” information about past use, but said cluster munitions were used after the country became independent in November 1975 and that “the racist regime in South Africa with heavy air force and artillery … carried [sic] out a series of attacks to the southern and southeastern provinces of Angola to prevent the independence, with the excuses of following the freedom fighter of SWAPO and ANC [independence movements for Namibia and South Africa respectively] inside Angola and also to stop the government forces attacking the rebels movement UNITA supported by USA.”[10]

Angola stated that its territory “became a cold war battlefield, with the Angolan government forces supported also by Soviet Union and Cuba.” Its 2017 statement added that “The war planes from South Africa Air Force were used on a daily base [sic] to strike government forces, SWAPO and ANC positions and other areas of the country indiscriminately. In that period, the Angolan Air Force also attacked UNITA positions to retaliate their extemporaneous ground attacks. This was the time when Clusters Munitions were used in Angola.”

The types of cluster munitions cleared by deminers in Angola include Soviet-made RBK 250-series cluster bombs.[11] In 2016, the HALO Trust cleared two Alpha submunitions during survey operations in Cunene province along with the remnants of CB470 cluster bombs. In September 2017, Angola said the Alpha bomblet was developed in Rhodesia in 1970 and later in South Africa in the 1980s.[12]