Angola slams 'unjust' arms trial in FranceAngola on Wednesday condemned the outcome of a high-profile arms smuggling smuggling, illegal transport across state or national boundaries of goods or persons liable to customs or to prohibition. Smuggling has been carried on in nearly all nations and has occasionally been adopted as an instrument of national policy, as by Great Britain trial in a French court, which convicted all but six of the 42 defendants, including the son of an ex-president. "This trial was unbalanced and unjust, tied up with political considerations and motives," said a Luanda government statement published by the state news agency Angop. The court in Paris Tuesday sentenced the main players in a network that flouted an international embargo and shipped arms to Angola during its civil war in the 1990s, including a former government minister and a son of the late President Francois Mitterrand Noun 1. Francois Mitterrand - French statesman and president of France from 1981 to 1985 (1916-1996) Francois Maurice Marie Mitterrand, Mitterrand . The French court also convicted Russian-Israeli tycoon Arkady Gaydamak in absentia in absentia (in ab-sensh-ee-ah) adj. or adv. phrase. Latin for "in absence," or more fully, in one's absence. Occasionally a criminal trial is conducted without the defendant being present when he/she walks out or escapes after the trial has begun, since the accused for organising the arms sales to the formerly Marxist regime led by President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who is still in power. The Angolan government said it was "stupefied stu·pe·fy tr.v. stu·pe·fied, stu·pe·fy·ing, stu·pe·fies 1. To dull the senses or faculties of. See Synonyms at daze. 2. To amaze; astonish. " by the conviction of "French citizens who helped our country to uphold the state and the democratic process, threatened by an armed subversion." The Angolan civil war The Angolan Civil War began when Angola won its war for independence in 1975 with the Communist MPLA fighting the anti-Communist UNITA. FLEC, an association of separatist militant groups, fought for the independence of Cabinda from 1975 until the mid-2000s. lasted from before independence in Portugal in 1975 to 2002, pitting the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA UNITA União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) ), today the main opposition party, against the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA MPLA Mountain Plains Library Association MPLA Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola (Portugese) MPLA Microsoft Product Licensing Advisor MPLA Movimento Popular para a Libertação de Angola ), which has always held power. The prolonged, mass trial in Paris heard that the MPLA was fuelled by a Soviet-made arsenal including 420 tanks, 150,000 shells, 170,000 anti-personnel mines, 12 helicopters and six warships, worth a total of 790 million dollars (534 million euros). In its first official reaction to the trial dubbed "Angolagate", the Luanda government charged that the whole caseload case·load n. The number of cases handled in a given period, as by an attorney or by a clinic or social services agency. caseload Noun had been motivated "by a spirit of vengeance on the part of certain Angolans who, despite the support of the French secret services, failed to take power by arms." The Paris court on Tuesday convicted Gaydamak, in his absence, and French businessman Pierre Falcone, who was in court, to six years in jail. Ex-interior minister Charles Pasqua was ordered jailed for a year, plus two more suspended, and he was heavily fined, like Jean-Christophe Mitterrand, son of the late president. No Angolans were among the 42 defendants, but the prosecution contended that about 30 officials, including President Dos Santos, were given sizeable bribes. Dos Santos broke off all contacts with Paris when the trial began. Since his election in 2007, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has attempted to renew the relationship. In May 2008, Sarkozy went to Luanda to "turn the page on the misunderstandings of the past." By the time Sarkozy visited, Angola had overtaken Nigeria as Africa's leading oil producer. 
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