Uganda Update
One of Africa's most brutal and bizarre conflicts is on the verge of resolution.
By the Hot Zone Team, Mon Sep 18, 7:59 PM ET
Late last month, the Ugandan government signed a cease-fire agreement with the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a notorious rebel group that has terrorized the people of northern Uganda for over 20 years.
Led by Joseph Kony, a self-declared prophet who has said he wants a government based on the Ten Commandments, the LRA is perhaps best known for its practice of kidnapping children — over 20,000 to date — to fill its ranks as soldiers, servants and even sex slaves. Thousands more have been killed or maimed, and 1.5 million people have been displaced.
Each night thousands of "night commuters" walk from their homes in the countryside and sleep in the relatively safe bigger cities to avoid being kidnapped. Thousands more live in squalid refugee camps. And while the rest of Uganda maintains a relatively progressive fight against
HIV/
AIDS, northern Uganda is struggling to fight the disease.
The cease fire is a major development, but significant issues must be resolved if a full peace is to take hold. Most notably, Kony and his top deputies face standing indictments from the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes and crimes against humanity. LRA leaders are demanding the charges be dropped.
Though the ICC opposes it, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni says he is prepared to give rebel leaders amnesty if a peace deal is achieved. Negotiations are continuing, and though Kony has not yet emerged from hiding to report to a meeting point in south Sudan, many LRA soldiers have done so over the past two weeks.
Kevin Sites' reports from northern Uganda in October 2005 showed that the LRA's brutal insurgency has dictated the way of life there. With the LRA laying down its arms, hopes are high that the suffering could soon end.
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