The World Food Programme (WFP) said yesterday it had completed an emergency airlift of food to Angolan refugees camped at the western Zambia border post of Kalabo.
A spokeswoman for the UN food aid agency said it had shipped 210 tonnes of food and worked with the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) to move 2,288 Angolans from the border post to an inland centre where they had access to food, medicine and shelter.
"The airlift took place over seven days and a total of 30 flights were done by WFP to complete the job," the spokeswoman said.
There are about 216,000 refugees in Zambia, among them at least 171,000 Angolans uprooted by the fighting back home. The UNHCR says 21,000 have entered Zambia since October, with 12,000 crossing this month.
The conflict in Angola, Africa's longest-running war, has killed more than a million people, or 10 per cent of Angola's population, displaced a further 50 per cent and driven 500,000 into neighbouring countries.
Meanwhile, Amnesty International has sent investigators to Namibia to investigate alleged gross human rights violations there and across the Angolan border, an Amnesty official said yesterday.