Huambo, Angola, April 2, 2025 (Lusa) - The Angolan provinces of Huambo and Benguela will be free of mined areas later this year, said the Director General of the National Mine Action Agency (ANAM), according to whom a further €240 million is needed to clear all known areas in Angola.
Leonardo Severino Sapalo was speaking to journalists after a visit by a delegation of diplomats from various nationalities to the British non-governmental organisation Halo Trust, as part of a trip to the Lobito Corridor.
"In Huambo province and Benguela province, the work of demining the known mined areas is practically coming to an end. In other words, the areas identified and catalogued in the national mine action database correspond with the operational reports on the completion of these tasks," he said.
The provincial government and municipal administrators will still have to confirm that the known mined areas no longer exist in order to declare the province free of known mined areas, he emphasised, since there is still a residual demining stage.
Angola went through a long civil war, almost 30 years after independence, which left extensive mined areas throughout the territory.
In the case of the Lobito Corridor, a railway. infrastructure that runs for around 1,300 kilometres across Angola from the port of Lobito to the border with Zambia, 43,142 anti-personnel mines, 2,460 anti-tank mines and 235,050 unexploded ordnance have been removed and destroyed over an area of 74,763,917 square metres.
However, in addition to Huambo and Benguela, at least 192 minefields are located along the Lobito Corridor in adjacent municipalities in the provinces of Bié and Moxico, according to estimates by HaloTrust, which has been operating in Angola since 1994.
According to Leonardo Sapalo, 975 areas need to be cleared throughout the country, and funding is needed to ensure that the demining units (Angolan Armed Forces and the National Demining Centre) have the logistical and technical capacity to carry out the intervention and, subsequently, eliminate these areas.
The director general of ANAM pointed out that it takes approximately $3.10 to clear a square metre, which means a financial effort of approximately $240 million to clear the known areas.
Leonardo Sapalo said that in addition to the General State Budget funds, international resources are being mobilised, and pointed out that in addition to the known areas, there could be others that have not yet been located.
The Lobito Corridor crosses several Angolan provinces in addition to Benguela and Huambo. Greater attention will now be paid to the provinces of Bié, Moxico, and Moxico Leste, and the entire area surrounding the railway has already been demined.
The Halo Trust headquarters was one of the stops on the diplomatic delegation, which was part of a visit organised by the US embassy to the Lobito Corridor with 17 European and other national ambassadors, as well as Angolan officials and business leaders.
The aim is to interact with local communities, demining experts and government authorities to assess the initiatives' impact and visit some business projects.
The Lobito Corridor, whose concession was awarded to Lobito Atlantic Railway, a consortium of three European companies including Portugal's Mota-Engil, is a priority infrastructure for the US and the European Union.
RR/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
Note: Lusa travelled at the invitation of the US Embassy in Luanda
