S. Africa, Cuba Accords by End of Year Seen : Pullouts From Namibia, Angola Await Schedule; Peace May Take Longer

Timetables for a Cuban pullout from Angola and a South African withdrawal from Namibia could be worked out by the end of the year after an agreement in principle among the countries involved, State Department officials said Thursday.

But the officials warned that a settlement of Angola’s 13-year-old civil war, the conflict at the heart of the U.S.-mediated negotiations in southern Africa, has not yet been found and almost surely will take much longer.

The United States, South Africa, Cuba and Angola reached an agreement in principle Wednesday under which Cuba would withdraw its estimated 50,000 troops from Angola, where they have been defending the Marxist government, while South Africa would end its 73-year-long rule of Namibia, also known as South-West Africa.

“We believe it’s possible that we can work out timetables this year,” a State Department official said. “A lot depends on whether the momentum of these negotiations can be maintained.”

Major Issues Unresolved

U.S., South African and Cuban officials all warned that major issues remain unresolved, but they confirmed that they have agreed to work toward linked timetables for troop withdrawals.

“It is not precise to say that an agreement has been reached on the withdrawal of Cuban troops,” said Alcibiades Hidalgo, a member of the Central Committee of Cuba’s Communist Party and of Havana’s delegation at the three days of talks in New York. “This issue . . . is part of all the discussions, is part of a process that is continuing. It is our opinion that we made substantial progress.”

He said that Cuba would be willing to remove its troops from Angola “in phases” once South Africa’s withdrawal from Namibia is nailed down.

In South Africa, Roelof F. (Pik) Botha, the foreign minister, said it is too early to interpret the progress made at the talks and that senior government officials will discuss the agreement next week.

‘A Lot of Hostility’

“They seem to have gone further than they’ve ever gone before,” Vernon A. Walters, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said in a television interview. But he added: “There are still many obstacles. . . . This war has been going on for . . . years. There’s a lot of hostility built up.”

The governments of Angola, Cuba and South Africa must first approve the agreement reached by their negotiators in New York. Assuming that they do that, another meeting already has been set for the week of Aug. 1.

U.S. officials said they believe talks between Angola’s Soviet-backed government and the U.S.-backed rebels led by Jonas Savimbi also should flow from the troop withdrawal talks, although they are not explicitly a part of the agreement reached Wednesday.

“The question of UNITA is a separate matter for resolution among Angolans,” State Department spokeswoman Phyllis Oakley said, referring to Savimbi’s group, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola. “We believe very strongly that it would be a great mistake if the issue were not discussed in parallel with the kind of progress we made in New York. And we have urged the parties to that conflict to think carefully about how an end to the war in Angola can be achieved.”

“We believe national reconciliation in Angola must be part of any settlement,” another official said. “But it is not there yet.”

The officials’ comments appeared to retreat somewhat from a statement Wednesday by Deputy Secretary of State John C. Whitehead, who said that the agreement would lead directly to “a reconstituted government in Angola which would include representatives of Jonas Savimbi.”

Times staff writer Scott Kraft, in Johannesburg, contributed to this story.