Pope Benedict XVI arrived on Friday in Angola's capital Luanda, on the second and final stop of an African tour that has been overshadowed by his controversial denunciation of condoms.

Angolan President Jose Eduardo dos Santos greeted him at the airport, where singing and dancing crowds had gathered outside the terminal to welcome him.

Crowds had started gathering at the airport at dawn, many of them women dressed in a traditional Catholic uniform of brightly-coloured headscarves and sarongs, with a white t-shirt showing the name of their church.

They carried banners saying "Welcome Pope Benedict" and "Bless our country", singing and dancing as they waited for him to emerge from the terminal.

Security around the airport was tight, with very restricted access to the building. International flights were put on hold to allow the pope to fly into Angola and armed police offices and soldiers watched the crowds, which were kept about half a kilometre from the building.

Benedict's trip is the first papal visit to Angola since 1992, when John Paul II came during a brief lull in the decades of war here.

Since Angola's civil war ended in 2002, the country's economy has boomed due to the enormous growth in oil exports, but the majority of the population still lives in abject poverty.

More than two-thirds of Angolans live on less than two dollars a day and the country has one of the highest child mortality rates in the world with one in four children dying before they reach their fifth birthday.

Benedict is making his inaugural journey to Africa as pope, but his trip has been overshadowed by remarks made en route to Cameroon, when he said that Aids "cannot be overcome through the distribution of condoms, which even aggravates the problems."

The comments sparked an uproar among Aids activists as well as some governments, who warned that the pope's remarks could harm prevention campaigns.

Sapa