A late donation to the World Food Programme (WFP) has guaranteed food rations to more than one million people in Angola until the end of December, according to WFP Public Affairs Officer in Luanda, Cristina Muller. However, Muller told IRIN on Thursday that there were still shortages on the horizon.

Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos has announced he will not run in the next election. However, the ongoing instability in the country means that a date for that election remains far from clear. President dos Santos told the congress of the ruling MPLA that the election could take place in 2002 or 2003.

The international humanitarian organisation Oxfam says the Angolan government is responding inadequately to the needs of people displaced by the civil war. Speaking at the end of a visit to Angola, Oxfam's director Barbara Stocking said an end to the war was the only way out of the humanitarian crisis in the country, and called on the international community to support a negotiated peace.

A patch of bare earth dotted with smoking fires has become home to the hundreds of people who arrive each day at the displaced people's camps outside Camacupa in the Angolan province of Bié.

Concern has warned of a "potential catastrophe" in the Angolan city of Kuito as malnutrition and mortality rates rise among 300,000 people that have fled fighting in surrounding areas.