2nd Namibian mass grave found

2005-11-11 21:35

Johannesburg - A second mass grave has been found at a former South African Defence Force base in northern Namibia, SABC news reported on Friday.

The human remains were found outside the former Eenhana base, close to the base's airstrip.

The bones are suspected to be those of South West African People's Organisation fighters who may have been killed in the so-called nine-day war near the end of South Africa's occupation of Namibia, which ended in 1990.

The Star newspaper reported that construction workers discovered a first mass grave containing human bones and ammunition 400 metres from the base on Thursday.

With the exhumation of the grave still in progress, it was not known how many bodies the grave contained.

Serious

"This is a serious matter; a huge massacre has happened. Those in the South African army need to tell us why they shot these people," Ohangwena regional governor Usko Nghaamwa told the newspaper.

Constand Viljoen, who was chief of the army from 1977 to 1985, said it was impossible for well disciplined South African troops to have buried guerrillas in mass graves, as dealing with any bodies had been a police function.

However, Jane's Defence Weekly correspondent Helmoed-Romer Heitman told The Star photographs existed of South African troops burying Swapo members towards the end of the liberation war in 1989 when, in the absence of mortuaries, the dead were buried in pits dug by front-end loaders.

A former SADF officer, however, said the burials in the pictures Heitman mentioned had been carried out by South West African police.

The grave was discovered near the Eenhana base, 100km from Oshakati, in the Oukwanyama district.

- SAPA