Spotlight

Think Africa Press: Protests Could Turn Violent in Tunisia, Angola and Egypt
June 15, 2012: Anti-government protests have been met with increasing violence over the past few months. Armed, plain-clothes pro-government militias of so-called ‘concerned citizens’ have attacked youth leaders with iron bars and mace spray to dissuade them from protesting, with police standing by. So far, the youth protests have been explicitly non-violent, but the youth movement’s intention to increase readiness for self-defence raises the potential of escalation.

AllAfrica: Angola: Rapper Set Free On Probation in Portugal
June 14, 2012: The Angolan rapper Luaty Beirão, whose artistic name is Ikonoklasta, who was arrested on June 11, at Lisbon International Airport accused of cocaine trafficking, was sent free last Tuesday on probation, after being interrogated at the Justice Campus of Portugal’s capital city.

FT: Angola’s Vicente rejects corruption fears
June 14, 2012: High above the relentless traffic of Luanda, Angola’s capital, the man at the centre of the scramble for Africa’s natural resources is just back from his morning jog. Manuel Vicente has spent the past decade stewarding an oil industry that now accounts for one in every 50 barrels of world production, forging Angola’s ties with China and building a personal portfolio that includes interests in banking and real estate. During 12 years as head of Sonangol, he transformed the state-owned oil company from the economic engine of the government’s military campaign during three decades of civil war into the continent’s foremost energy group, with assets from Iraq to Cuba and annual revenues of $34bn.

Businessweek: Sonangal Says Cobalt Selections Followed Angola Law
June 14, 2012: Sonangol EP, Angola’s state-owned oil company, said its selection of Cobalt International Energy Inc. and other partners in offshore crude fields followed Angolan law. Recent oil discoveries in Angola have attracted “parties interested in causing controversy where none exists,” Sonangol, based in Luanda, said in a statement today. Sonangol selected Cobalt and its partners “through processes which included an open and transparent lease sale for the deep-water pre-salt blocks.”