SUMMARY
Angola has a history of long-standing state-based conflicts concerning incompatibilities over government and territory that have involved various rebel groups. These conflicts have torn the country on the national and regional levels, and included continuous incidents of one-sided violence perpetrated by rebel groups and the Government of Angola.
Since 1989, Angola has experienced the intrastate and one-sided categories of organized violence, as defined by UCDP.
2025
Fatalities in 2025 were the result of the territorial conflict over Cabinda. The fighting between FLEC-FAC-TN and the Government of Angola continued in the Cabinda exclave, especially in the Belize municipality and along the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo. Some violence also reportedly spread into the Tshela territory of the DR Congo, in the vicinity of Cabinda. During the first half of 2025, FLEC-FAC-TN released multiple claims of armed clashes, but their activity declined in the second half of the year. The Government of Angola continued to deny instability in the region.
Constant violence
Organized violence in Angola has led to several peaks in number of fatalities throughout the time-period. The most pronounced peaks are the result of the combination of violent events related to the state-based conflict over government, and events of one-sided violence perpetrated by UNITA. Only the peak from 1998 involved fatalities from the state-based conflicts over government and territory as well as incidences of one-sided violence perpetrated by the rebel group UNITA and the Government of Angola.
The first peak happened in 1989 in connection to the conflict over government, even after South Africa and Cuba, allies of UNITA and the Angolan Government, respectively, pulled back their troops from Angola. Fighting was most intense in the provinces of Bie, Huambo and Benguela. UNITA also carried out several attacks against civiliansacross the country, with particularly deathly attacks taking place in Cuanza Norte.
The number of fatalities decreased dramatically in 1991 as the fall of communism meant the end of Russian intervention in the civil war in Angola, and as UNITA and the MPLA government signed the Bicesse Peace Agreement. The agreement provided the installation of a multi-party system, which allowed presidential elections to be held the following year. In 1992, fighting started again and the number in fatalities rose rapidly after MPLA won the presidential election and UNITA’s leader, Savimbi, claimed fraud. The number of fatalities reached by far the greatest magnitude during the whole time-period in 1993, as UNITA managed to take control of over three quarters of the country and intense fighting with the Angolan Government broke out across the country. Civilian massacres perpetrated by UNITA in the Huambo province also contributed to the high number of fatalities that year.
In 1994, the number of fatalities related to the conflict over government started declining again during that year’s negotiation process, but fighting between the Government of Angola and UNITA still left a high death toll, especially in the central Angolan town of Kuito. In relation to the conflict over the Cabinda exclave, both rebel groups FLEC-FAC and FLEC-R were actively fighting the government in the Cabinda province. Finally, fatalities resulting from attacks by UNITA against civilians declined sharply, but left the high death tolls in the Cuanza Norte and Cuanza Sul provinces.
After a few years of low intensity violence in Angola, the peak of 1998 involved all the active dyads in the country. The intra-state conflict between UNITA and the Government of Angola started again, hitting the town of Kuito especially hard. The dyads related to the conflict over the Cabinda exclave continued to be active, with fighting between FLEC-FAC and FLEC-R against the government. Finally, both UNITA and the Angolan Government perpetrated acts of one-sided violence. While the former carried out civilian massacres in the Malanje province and the town of Kuito, the latter’s most violent massacre took place in the Cabinda region. Attacks by the Government of Angola against civilians took place in the city of Luanda and the Malanje province.
The number of fatalities peaked again in 1999, after the agreement between UNITA and the government collapsed. Fighting between the parties and against civilians picked up as the Government of Angola launched a large-scale military offensive forcing the rebel group to resort one again to small-scale guerrilla incursions. Violence was particularly intense in the provinces of Bie, Huambo and Malanje. The number of deaths resulting from attacks by UNITA against civilians increased and the most violent massacres took place in the provinces of Cuanza, Huambo and Malanje.
The next peak in number of fatalities happened in 2001, with instances of fighting between the Angolan Government and UNITA as well as civilian massacres carried out by that rebel group. The number of deaths from the fighting between the parties declined almost by half, and the government rapidly gained the upper hand which ultimately led to the end of the intra-state conflict the following year. However, 2001 saw the highest peak in one-sided violence over the whole time-period totaling over a thousand civilian deaths across the country, from which the vast majority were the result of UNITA’s attacks against civilians.
During the following years, fatalities were the result of the territorial conflict over Cabinda and one-sided violence perpetrated by the Angolan Government. The Cabinda conflict involved fighting between either FLEC-FAC-TN or FLEC-FAC and the Government of Angola and saw peaks in casualties in the years 2007, 2009, 2016, 2017 and 2019. Violence against civilians by the Government of Angola fluctuated over the years with peaks in 2003 - associated with one-sided attacks on villages in Cabinda - and in 2018.
In 2020, the fighting between FLEC-FAC-TN and the Government of Angola continued in the Cabinda territory and advanced into close villages of the DR Congo (Zaire) and Congo. Additionally, several incidents of one-sided violence by the Government of Angola happened in Luanda, some of them in connection to the implementation of Covid-related restrictions.
The following year, however, no military operations were reported by FLEC-FAC-TN or FLEC-FAC, deeming the conflict over Cabinda as not active in 2021 due to no activity. FLEC-FAC-TN argued they were respecting the ceasefire called upon by UN Secretary General during the Covid pandemic. At the same time, there were several comunicados released by the group to ask the UN, the Biden administration and other governments to support the independence of Cabinda. Moreover, in February 2022, the Angolan Government admitted publicly for the first time the existence of military actions in Cabinda against armed criminal groups, even if it did not mention the FLEC-FAC insurgencies in particular.
Angola as a secondary warrying party
Angola was a secondary warring party in the intrastate conflicts in the Republic of Congo and the DR Congo (Zaire). In 1997, it supported the Cobras against the Congolese government and in 1998, 1999 and 2002, Angola backed the Congolese government against the Cocoyes, Ninjas and Ntsiloulous. Angola also supported the AFDL (Alliance des forces démocratiques pour la libération du Congo-Kinshasa; Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Kinshasa) in neighboring DR Congo (Zaire) in toppling president Mobutu in 1997. Thereafter it backed the Government of DR Congo (Zaire) made up of former AFDL members until 2002.
Pre-1989 conflicts
The intrastate conflict and the conflict over the Cabinda exclave started well before 1989. On one hand, the conflict over government started in the mid-20th century when pro-independence movements emerged in Angola, which had been a Portuguese colony for centuries. Angola’s drive for independence was further spurred when neighboring Belgian Congo became independent in 1960. The following year, two rival pro-independence movements, FNLA (Frente Nacional de Libertação de Angola; National Front for the Liberation of Angola) and MPLA (Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola, Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola), engaged in an armed extra-state conflict with the Portuguese authorities. In 1966, they were joined by UNITA (União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola; National Union for the Total Independence of Angola). However, dissension between the three groups severely weakened them and the Portuguese got the upper hand in the early 1970s. The situation suddenly changed in 1974, when a bloodless military coup in Portugal brought to power a new government that was willing to grant Angola independence. The Portuguese left the country in 1975, however, they did not hand over power to any particular pro-independence group and an intrastate conflict over the government of newly independent Angola ensued between them. MPLA succeeded in forming an internationally recognized Marxist-inspired government, but it was challenged by FNLA and UNITA. With the support of Cuba, the MPLA government succeeded in defeating FNLA in the late 1970s, but UNITA continued the intrastate conflict.
On the other hand, the Angolan government faced an insurgency in the oil-rich Angolan exclave Cabinda, which is separated from the rest of the country by a sliver of the DR Congo (Zaire). Cabinda produces around 60% of Angola’s oil revenues. Hence, it is of great economic importance. As early as 1963, a pro-independence movement, FLEC (Frente para a Libertaçâo do Enclave de Cabinda, Front of Liberation of the State of Cabinda) formed, but was suppressed by the Portuguese and later the MPLA government in newly independent Angola. In the 1980s tensions within FLEC led to its fragmentation into several factions, among them FLEC-R (FLEC–Renovada, FLEC–Renewed) and FLEC-FAC (FLEC– Forças Armadas de Cabinda, FLEC–Armed Forces of Cabinda), which engaged in an armed struggle against the Angolan government. In 2010, FLEC-FAC splintered again between the leadership in Africa and the leadership in Europe.
