Angola will host on 22-26 June in Luanda, the meeting of the intercession of the Kimberley Process (KP) that will bring together more than 200 delegates from 82 countries.

The event which has been held annually since the founding of the Kimberley Process (KP) in 2003, aims at assessing the activities undertaken thus far as well as to prepare the issues to be discussed at the plenary session which will be held in November in the Angolan capital.

The Kimberley Process is an international certification scheme that regulates the trade of rough diamonds by preventing the flow of diamonds from conflict and war zones. Angola chairs the Kimberley Process since January 2015.

Source: ANGOP

The Defence Minister of the Central African Republic (CAR), Marie Noel Kuoyara, thanked on June 5th, in Luanda, the Angolan Government’s support for her country to achieve political stability.

Speaking to the press following a meeting with her Angolan counterpart, João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço, Kuoyara said that RCA and Angola are brother countries as it was seen during the period of crisis in her country, where Angola helped.

She said that her country has a lot to learn from Angola, because Angola also had its difficult moments but could overcome them and now has been achieving visible progress.

Marie Noel Kuoyara added that thanks to the support from the international community, particularly from the Angolan President José Eduardo dos Santos, CAR held a national forum, which has enabled Central Africans to follow the paths of peace.

“We are currently in a peace process and we ask God that it may prevail so that the country can develop”, added the CAR minister.

The CAR Defense Minister made a stopover in Luanda, after attending a conference on peace and security at the UN headquarters.

Source: ANGOP

A forum of the heads of the parliamentary groups of the ruling parties in the SADC region, was held on June 3 – 4, in Luanda. The forum aims to become a privileged venue for the ruling parties in Southern Africa region to discuss and seek joint solutions for issues affecting the region’s peoples and governments.

During the event, matters such as democracy and development as well as conflict prevention in the SADC region were discussed. Economic integration policies and movement of people and goods and their constraints were also discussed at the forum, which was held under the theme “Democracy and Security in the SADC Region”.

Virgílio de Fontes Pereira, head of the parliamentary group of the ruling MPLA party, said that Angola assumed with pride and responsibility the opportunity to host the forum.

The head of the parliamentary group of the ruling SWAPO party in Namibia, Taeyele Evelyn, suggested holding annual forums to share ideas and programs to improve the living conditions of the populations in the SADC region.

Source: ANGOP

The Republic of Angola, through its Ministry of Urbanization and Housing, was elected on May 25, in New York as a member of the governing board of UN-Habitat, for a four-year term, starting on January 1st, 2016.

Angola will fill one of two vacancies to be opened in the Southern African region, with the end of the mandates of South Africa and Lesotho, on December 31, 2015.

Nigeria, Kenya and Chad are the other African countries also elected to the same body, covering their regional vacancies.

For Asia and the Pacific, Bahrain and India were elected, for Eastern Europe (Georgia and Serbia), for Latin America and the Caribbean (Brazil, Chile and Mexico) and for Western Europe and other States (Germany and Sweden).

Source: ANGOP