General
Adoption of Universal Periodic Review (UPR); Angola elected to UN HRC despite human rights concerns
On 2nd July 2025, during the 59th Session of the Human Rights Council, the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Angola was adopted. During the working group, Angola received 283 recommendations from other states, of which 209 were accepted and 74 noted by the government of Angola. During the adoption, several human rights groups highlighted several persistent civic space issues, including excessive and unlawful use of force during protests, impunity for human rights violations during protests and the adoption of restrictive legislation affecting freedom of association, peaceful assembly and expression.
In July 2024, Plataforma Lusófona dos Direitos Humanos (PLUDH) and CIVICUS submitted a joint UPR stakeholder submission on civic space restrictions and violations in Angola. The submission highlights restrictive legislation affecting civic space, the arbitrary arrest and prosecution of activists, journalists and protesters, the use of excessive force during peaceful protests and the arrest of protesters.
On 14th October 2025, Angola was elected to the UN Human Rights Council, consisting of 47 states, for a period of three years, starting on 1st January 2026. The election comes despite serious concerns regarding the country’s respect for human rights. In the past months, authorities have cracked down on protests against the increase in fuel and transport prices and have arbitrarily detained activists and leaders of taxi associations and cooperatives.
Peaceful Assembly
Fuel price increase protests: 30 killed, 277 injured, over 1,500 arrested
Protests erupted in July 2025 over the decision by Angolan authorities to cut fuel price subsidies, increasing the price of diesel from 300 to 400 Angolan kwanza’s per litre (0.32 USD to 0.43 USD). Transport prices in Angola - one of Africa’s top oil producing countries - reportedly increased by up to 50%, with other living costs expected to increase.
Protests and strikes erupted over the fuel and transport price increases. On 12th July 2025, protests, mobilised by civil society groups and youth movements, took place in Luanda. According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), police used unnecessary force, including firing tear gas, rubber bullets and assaulting protesters, injuring several people on 12th July 2025. While authorities had authorised the protest, police used force to disperse the protest when hundreds of protesters approached the Largo 1° de Maio, a symbolic space in downtown Luanda, the envisioned end point of the march. 17 people were reportedly arrested, 16 of whom were released the same day.
A protest scheduled for 19th August 2025 by the Movimiento de estudantes angolanos (Movement of Angolan Students), against increasing prices, including tuition fees, transport and fuel prices, was blocked by the police. Hundreds of students attempted to march to the Ministry of Finance in Luanda. Similarly, police prevented another protest planned for 26th July 2025 by blocking the intended route of the protest in Luanda.
A three-day strike, organised by taxi drivers’ association Associação Nova Aliança dos Taxistas de Angola (ANATA), started on 28th July 2025, and grew into larger protests against the rising diesel prices and cost of living . Police responded with excessive force, including live ammunition, tear gas and batons when violence, looting and clashes broke out, reportedly first in parts of Luanda and spreading to other cities, including Huambo, Benguela and Huíla.
On 31st July 2025, spokesperson for the National Police, Mateus Rodrigues, said that 30 people had been killed and 277 people injured in the violence and clashes surrounding the taxi strike. Additionally, over 1,500 people were detained and numerous buildings and cars destroyed in Luanda, Benguela, Icolo e Bengo, Bengo, Huíla, Malanje, Huambo, and Lunda Norte. Summary trials of hundreds of people reportedly took place in Luanda and in the provinces, often on charges related to participating in a riot and vandalism.
In September, five Angolan human rights organisations – Friends of Angola, Omunga, Mudei, Associação Justiça e Paz (AJPD) and Handeka – wrote an open letter to United Nations Secretary General Antonio Gutierrez calling for an International Independent Fact-Finding Mission into the killings of 28th to 30th July. The organisations denounced the use of excessive force, including live ammunition, by security forces against protesters, acts of torture, enforced disappearances and the use of sexual violence and beatings during detention.
Police prevent, disrupt holding of vigils to demand the release of political prisoners
On 25th October 2025, police halted a vigil in Luanda to demand the release of political prisoners, in particular those arrested in relation to the July protests against the hike in fuel prices (see under Association) and “all forms of persecution in Angola”. The vigil, organised by civil society group União Nacional para a Total Revolução de Angola (UNTRA) was to take place at the square Largo das Heroínas in Luanda at 18:00 local time, but activists were met with a cordon of police officers at the square and surrounding streets, with visible police vehicles present. Activists told media that police warned activists of “consequences” for anyone daring to enter the square. Organisers said they had communicated the plan to hold the vigil with administrative local authorities.
A previous attempt to hold a vigil on 17th October 2025 was disrupted by police officers, who removed activists from Jardim São Domingos in Luanda. Police removed, with force, several people, who were wearing black T-shirts with “Free Voices, Free Political Prisoners". A dozen people were reportedly arrested.
General strike by public media suspended by court
On 5th September 2025, the Luanda District Court suspended a general strike by journalists and workers of public media, planned for 8th September, alleging the strike would violate citizens’ fundamental right to freedom of information. The strike, organised by the Syndicate of Journalists of Angola (SJA), was in response to the non-compliance by the government of an agreement reached in April 2025 to increase salaries by 58% from August 2025.
198 protesters arrested in July 2025 still await appeal
According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), 198 people, who were sentenced to four to eight years in prison by the Saurimo District Court in the province of Lunda Sul in July 2024 for alleged participation in protests, continue to wait for their appeals to be heard. The nearly 200 people were arrested during largely peaceful protests in four cities in the provinces of Lunda Sul and Lunda Norte, organised by the Lunda Tchokwe Protectorate Movement in October 2023 to advocate for more political autonomy in eastern Angola. Police responded during and after the protests with excessive use of force, including beatings and tear gas, and arrested protesters and bystanders.
On July 19, police detained activist Sérgio Osvaldo Kaholo, a member of the Movement Against Fuel Price Hikes and protest co-organizer. The public prosecutor handed Kaholo trumped-up charges of rebellion and incitement to violence and denied him bail. https://t.co/Ts9vUq3y5h
— Human Rights Foundation (HRF) (@HRF) August 1, 2025
Association
Fuel price increase protests: Arrest, intimidation, attack on HRDs
Several HRDs were subjected to arbitrary detention, judicial harassment and/or intimidation in the context of the protests against the fuel price hike. On 19th July 2025, officers of the Criminal Investigation Service (SIC) arbitrarily detained activist Osvaldo Caholo at his home in Luanda. Caholo, co-organiser of the protests against the diesel price hike, is accused of rebellion, public instigation to commit a crime and public vindication of a crime in relation to the protests. The accusations relate to a live broadcast on social media from the protests, which SIC claims “made serious threats against the integrity of general officers, commissioners, and other entities”. Caholo was placed in preventive detention, and started a hunger strike against his prolonged preventive detention and the conditions in Calomboloca prison.
Caholo was one of the 15+2 activists, who were jailed in 2015 and convicted in March 2016 of preparatory acts of rebellion and association of criminals for having organised a reading and discussion of Gene Sharp’s book “From Dictatorship to Democracy”, on non-violent resistance to repressive regimes. The Supreme Court later ordered their release and charges were dropped.
Activist Serroto José de Oliviera, also known as General Nila, was shot in the leg on 28th July 2025 by unidentified armed men, believed to be SIC agents. The activist, leader of the UNTRA Movement (Unidade Nacional para total Revolução de Angola) was filming a live video with fellow activists in Luanda on the first day of the three-day strike and protest, when he was shot. According to Amnesty International, he was taken to the Talatona Municipal Command Station after a brief visit to the Gameque village hospital, where he was interrogated by police officers. He was reportedly held incommunicado until he was presented before a court in Luanda on 1st August 2025, but was not formally charged. On 6th August 2025, he was transferred to the central jail, without the knowledge of his lawyer, before being transferred back to SIC cells a few hours later.
According to Movimento Contra a Subida dos Combustíveis (Movement against Fuel Price Increases), which gathers several Angolan activists against the fuel price hike, officers of the Rapid Intervention Police raided the home of HRD Laurinda Gouveia on 28th July 2025. In the absence of the activist, the officers assaulted Gouveia’s husband, Agostinho Alfredo, leaving him unconscious. Like Caholo, Gouveia was one of the 15+2 activists, who were prosecuted in 2015-2016.
According to civil society groups, activist Kiluanje Lourenço, also known as Jesse, was reportedly sentenced on 31st July 2025 to four months in prison in Malanje for having filmed the protests.
Fuel price increase protests: leaders of taxi associations and cooperatives detained
Leaders of taxi associations and cooperatives, including Associação Nova Aliança dos Taxistas de Angola (ANATA; New Alliance Association of Taxi Drivers of Angola), the taxi drivers’ association that had called for a strike on 28th to 30th July 2025 (see under Peaceful Assembly) were targeted with arrests and prosecutions in relation to the strike.
- On 1st August 2025, SIC had announced the detention of Rodrigo Luciano Catimba, vice-president of ANATA, in the province of Benguela, the previous day. Catimba is accused of incitement to violence, rebellion, condoning crime, and terrorism through the promotion of the taxi strike.
- On 8th August 2025, officers of the Criminal Investigation Service (SIC) detained the president of ANATA, Francisco Paciente, reportedly on accusations of criminal association, incitement to violence, attacks on transport safety and terrorism.
- On 10th August 2025, three other leaders of taxi associations were reported to have been detained in Luanda on accusations of criminal association, incitement to violence, terrorism and attacks against transport security: Francisco Eduardo of Associação de Taxistas de Angola (ATA), Rafael Ginga Inácio of the Cooperativa de Táxis Comunitários de Angola (CTCA - Cooperative of Community Taxis of Angola) and António Alexandre Freitas of Cooperativa dos Taxistas e Motociclistas (CTMF - Taxi Drivers and Motorcyclists Cooperative).
- On 13th August 2025, SIC agents detained Leonardo Lopes, president of Associação dos Taxistas e Lotadores de Angola (ATLA - Angolan Taxi Drivers and Loan Operators Association), Melo Celestino Raimundo, president of Associação dos Brigadistas de Paragem de Táxi (ABTAXI) and Pedro Fernandes, also known as “Mavinga”, president of Cooperativa Dois PN (2PN) in Luanda. SIC spokesperson Manuel Halaiwa said that the three were accused of having participated in the organisation and promotion of acts of vandalism and disorder against public and private property and services. Pedro Fernandes was released on 20th August 2025, reportedly due to the absence of an arrest warrant, excessive prison time, and a lack of evidence.
Intimidation of human rights lawyer
In a statement issued in September 2025, several lawyers’ associations, including Lawyers for Lawyers and the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute, expressed concern about the discovery, on 26th August 2025, of a bullet on the windshield of the vehicle of human rights lawyer Zola Ferreira Bambi. Although the circumstances surrounding the incident remain unclear, the organisations say it is not an isolated incident and illustrate the perilous situation of lawyers in Angola. As reported previously on the Monitor, Ferreira Bambi had been subjected to threats, physical violence and surveillance for the past ten years. In January 2024, he was placed under house arrest, without an arrest warrant, and was later escorted to the police station, where he was held for several hours, preventing him from representing two HRDs in court.
Expression
Internet blackouts during fuel price hike protests
Media reports and civil society organisations have reported internet blackouts during the July protests. A group of CSOs, including Friends of Angola and OMUNGA, said internet access was cut on 19th July 2025, half an hour after peaceful protests started in Luanda and in other provinces. Angola Cables, the company responsible for the internet distribution in Angola, however stated that the blackout was a result of a “technical malfunction” caused by damaged fibre optic cables during roadworks, affecting several operators. Internet access resumed after a few hours.
Detention of journalist
On 14th August 2025, SIC agents detained Alfredo Armando Bumba, journalist for Jornal Expansão, on suspicion of having relations with two Russian citizens who were arrested and charged with terrorism, financing terrorism, criminal association, document forgery, and illicit introduction of foreign currency into the country. The journalist, who said he has met the two accused, denied he was involved in any illegal acts. The journalist was released after 48 hours.