Speaking to Lusa, defense lawyer António Nasso said the court convicted six of the seven defendants and acquitted Adelino Camulongo Bacia, a National Police officer.
António Nasso, from the David Mendes & Associados Law Firm, said that the defense will appeal the sentence that sentenced the group's leader, João Deussino, to 15 years in prison, Domingos Gabriel Muecália to eight years, Francisco António Ngunga Nguli to five, Arão Rufino Eduardo Kalala to three years and six months in prison and Cresceciano Capamba to three.
The lawyer said that the court also sentenced Pedro João da Cunha, an employee of the records store in the municipality of Ecunha, accused of the crime of document forgery, to a three-year sentence suspended for four years, which for the defense represented "an imbalance, a violation of the norm", in relation to the other defendants who received the same sentence.
According to the lawyer, this issue will serve as an argument in the appeal filed by the defense of the five defendants, who will remain in prison until the court's decision.
"We have 20 days to present our allegations," said the lawyer, adding that the court rejected, even without "legitimacy to do so", the defense's request for the status of collaborating defendant or plea bargain for its constituents.
The defense emphasized that, according to the law, it is up to the Public Prosecutor's Office to accept or reject the status of collaborating defendant and did so, therefore it does not understand the court's refusal, which considered that there were no new elements regarding the process in the production of evidence.
"There was 'ex-new' [something new], like the arrival of mercenaries to Angola. This was at the time of the production of the evidence that was brought to the table, the issue of the devices that were thrown into the river, among other elements, there were several", he stated.
The defendants were charged as co-authors of the crimes of terrorist organization, manufacture, acquisition or possession of explosive, toxic and asphyxiating substances, criminal association, manufacture, trafficking, detection and alteration of prohibited weapons and ammunition and forgery of documents.
The case was made public by the authorities in January of this year, when they announced the dismantling of "a subversive group" that intended to attack several strategic targets in Luanda and Huambo, for example, the Angolan Presidency, the Luanda Refinery and the United States embassy during Joe Biden's visit, having seized ten explosives.
At the time, the spokesperson for the Criminal Investigation Service (SIC), Manuel Halaiwa, said that João Deussino, 34, self-proclaimed president of the revolutionary movement Frente Unida de Reedificação da Ordem Africana (FUROA), intended to overthrow the Government and establish a new regime, with a police officer and a justice official also among those arrested.
The organization, identified as having international connections, emerged in 2017, in the province of Huambo, and began to be monitored by authorities in October 2014, the first date scheduled for the former North American leader to visit Angola.
The explosive devices that would be used in the terrorist attacks included hand grenades of Russian, German and Portuguese origin, and do not belong to the arsenal of the Angolan Armed Forces, suggesting that they were acquired clandestinely, Manuel Halaiwa indicated in January.
