Uganda repatriates Kony’s wives, children from Central African Republic

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The Ugandan government has repatriated two women reported to be wives of fugitive Lord’s Resistance Army commander Joseph Kony, together with several children from the Central African Republic.

The women, identified as Ikol Grace (Ugandan) and South Sudanese national Aniyessi Teregina, arrived Friday, May 22, 2026, in Entebbe aboard a military aircraft from Bangui.

In the company of three children, they were received at Uganda Peoples' Defence Forces Air Force base by the Chief of Defence Intelligence and Security, Major General Richard Otto.

A media release from the Ministry of Defence and Veterans Affairs states the women (both aged 33 ) have three children, said to have been fathered by Kony while in CAR.

Two of them, aged eight and two years, belong to Ikol. 

The third child, also aged two years, is Teregina's adopted son, whose mother reportedly died in CAR.

According to the UPDF, the women are among eight wives and 13 children who escaped from an LRA camp earlier this year after an armed group attacked the hideout located south of Darfur near the border triangle of CAR, Sudan and South Sudan.

The MoDVA release states that the repatriation offers another glimpse into the shrinking but still active remnants of the LRA network that for decades terrorised communities across Northern Uganda and Central Africa through massacres, mutilations and mass child abductions.

In 2003, Ikol aged 10, was abducted from Amuria District during the height of the LRA insurgency, while in 2006, Teregina, aged 13, was kidnapped from Yambio in Western Equatoria State, South Sudan.

Col Chris Magezi, the Acting Director of Defence Public Information, has revealed that Teregina will be facilitated to return to South Sudan and reunite with her relatives, while the Congolese and CAR nationals who escaped alongside them have already been handed over to their respective families.

The latest repatriation adds to a growing number of former LRA captives and relatives of Kony being recovered from Central Africa as the rebel movement continues to weaken under sustained regional military pressure.

Magezi also revealed that more than 150 former LRA captives, including some of Kony’s wives and children, were repatriated to Uganda from CAR between 2023 and 2024 after escaping rebel captivity.

The return of Kony’s relatives also comes months after another wife and three children linked to the rebel leader were repatriated from CAR in February 2026.

Meanwhile, Kony reportedly remains at large more than two decades after launching a brutal insurgency against the Ugandan government.

Kony is wanted by the International Criminal Court on 36 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity, allegedly committed between 2002 and 2005 in northern Uganda.

The charges include murder, rape, enslavement, forced recruitment of children and sexual violence committed during one of the region’s deadliest rebel conflicts.

The United States has previously offered a reward of up to $5 million (sh19.5 billion) for information leading to Kony’s arrest.

The Lord’s Resistance Army emerged in northern Uganda in the late 1980s and became internationally notorious for abducting thousands of children who were forced into combat, slavery and forced marriages.

Although weakened over the years through regional military offensives and defections, intelligence reports suggest small LRA factions continue operating in remote areas of Central African Republic and bordering regions.