LUANDA, July 4 (Reuters) - China will provide an additional $135 million in financing to rebuild Angola's electricity, water and road systems, expanding its stake in the oil-rich African nation, Angola's state-run ANGOP news agency said on Friday. Oil-backed credit from the Export-Import Bank of China has allowed Angola to bypass traditional lenders, including the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, as it rebuilds its infrastructure following a 27-year civil war that ended in 2002. The exact amount of the Chinese credit is unknown, though it is believed to be between $4 billion and $11 billion. ANGOP said the two countries signed three financing agreements on Thursday during a visit by Ex-Im Bank Governor Li Ruogu to the Angolan capital Luanda. The credit will fund the modernisation of the electricity system in two cities in Lunda Norte and Luanda Sul provinces, construction of a water treatment plant and canals in the Luanda area and a roads upgrade in two other provinces, ANGOP said. The Chinese have also agreed to help establish a malaria prevention and treatment centre in Luanda's General Hospital. Commercial links between the two countries have expanded since 2004 when China, keen to gain access to oil and other natural resources in Africa to feed its growing economy, began providing credit to Angola. Trade between the two nations is estimated to be worth $4.9 billion per year, ANGOP said. Angola has one of the world's fastest-growing economies, registering double-digit growth rates in recent years. But the Chinese credit has raised concerns that Angola, sub-Saharan Africa's largest oil producer after Nigeria, has little incentive to implement democratic reforms, fight government corruption and make its economy more transparent. Angola's government, a mix of reformed Marxists and Western-leaning technocrats, has rejected demands that it take such steps in return for financing from the IMF and other international lenders. The IMF and Angola have been at loggerheads since 2002, when a leaked Fund report alleged that $1 billion had vanished from Luanda's coffers in the previous year. U.S.-based Human Rights Watch added fuel to the fire when it said in a separate report that $4 billion in oil revenue had gone missing from Angola's treasury between 1997 and 2002. Angola, which has a high rate of poverty and one of the continent's worst infant mortality rates, has blamed accounting problems for the discrepancies. (Reporting by Paul Simao; Editing by Malcolm Whittaker)
A soldier of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) shovels algae onto a truck along the coastline of Qingdao, Shandong province July 4, 2008. China has thrown 10,000 people and 1,200 vessels ...
