Members of a Christian sect in Angola appear to have been targeted by government forces and the police.
“The Light of the World” sect is led by Jose Kalupeteka, a popular and anti-authority preacher who believes the end of the world will happen on 31 December.
Kalupeteka's popularity can be seen internet videos of outdoor sermons where thousands of followers, including women and children, sit on crowded hillsides.
President Eduardo dos Santos' (pictured) government accuses the group, an offshoot of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, of mistreating its members by encouraging them to live in seclusion and defy Angola's laws.
Tensions around this group have only heightened the competition between the ruling MPLA and the opposition UNITA party. Both these groups fought each other during the country’s 27-year civil war which ended in 2002.
The police say they killed 13 of the sect’s “snipers” during a raid to capture the sect’s leader in the remote hills where the group were camped.
Police said the raid came after nine police officers were killed by the sect.
But UNITA and human rights activists claim that more than 1,000 civilians were killed by the police and military in the siege.
The MPLA-run local government denied access to the hills for two weeks after the clashes, making it difficult to speak to any witnesses or sect members.
What could be found after that were burned and looted makeshift metal shacks, pots of abandoned food, burnt-out vehicles, clothes strewn on the ground and bloodstains in the soil.
UNITA is calling for an independent investigation, but the provincial governor says there are no plans for this.
President dos Santos has ruled the country, home for 21 million people, for 36 years. His government has recently begun to ban church groups.
