Agenda is agreed for Angolan peace talks

ADDIS ABABA - The resumption of peace talks on Angola did little yesterday to lift the pessimism surrounding the country's renewed civil war, writes Karl Maier. The first UN-brokered negotiations for two months between the government of President Eduardo dos Santos and Jonas Savimbi's rebel Unita movement brought few prospects of a quick end to the war.

A day of negotiations in the Ethiopian capital chaired by the UN's special envoy to Angola, Margaret Anstee, reached agreement on an agenda for talks similar to the previous encounter between the two sides in November. The talks are being observed by ambassadors from Portugal, the US and Russia, which brokered the May 1991 peace agreement that was to have ended Angola's 16-year civil war.

Ms Anstee said the talks were dealing with 'very difficult and important issues'. She said the agenda would deal with agreeing a new ceasefire, fulfilling the 1991 peace accords, the United Nations' role and the freeing of all prisoners.