Angola: The Weight of History, Patrick Chabal and Nuno Vidal (eds), C Hurst & Co, 256 pp, £17.99, ISBN: 978-1850658849

In early 2001, in a small meeting room in a rehabilitated building in the town of Kuito, in Bié province in Angola, the local security officer for the United Nations told us of a new government policy that was likely to impact on our work. It was called limpeza, meaning cleaning, or cleansing.

The army was “cleaning out” the