Kony Attacks From Sudan

By Emmy AllioTHE relative peace and security the north has enjoyed in the past two years appears to have ended. About 300 LRA rebels on Saturday killed two civilians in an attack on a Local Defence Unit detachment in Agoro market, Lamwo county, Kitgum district. They struck terror in the area which had over the last two years almost returned to normalcy.“A group of Kony rebels have attacked and were beaten off by the UPDF. We are monitoring their movements and want to verify whether their leader, Joseph Kony, is with them,” Gulu-based 4th Division spokesman Capt. Khelil Magara said yesterday.The army’s director of information and public relations, Major Shaban Bantariza, said, “We are pursuing them. We cannot just allow them to come and kill our people. LRA is a terrorist organisation which must not be allowed any room in the country.”Sources said a week ago, Sudanese government war planes attacked Kony rebel camps near Juba city in southern Sudan, ending the marriage of convenience between the LRA and Omar Bashir’s government. The current efforts to restore diplomatic relations between the Sudan and Uganda gained momentum when Bashir announced in Kampala last year that his government had ended its support to LRA. The ties were severed in April 1995. Thousands of civilians in the north have been killed, maimed and abducted in over a decade of fighting which began in 1986 with armed opposition to the then National Resistance Army (NRA) by remnants of Uganda National Liberation Army (UNLA). Bantariza assured the people in the north that the UPDF was in full control and there was no cause for alarm. “We are deploying effectively on the Sudan border. This is an invasion,” Bantariza said. But there is likelihood of a danger to the on-going talks between the government and a splinter group of LRA under the command of self-styled Lt. Col. Onen Kamdulu. The faction is based at Awonyiru village in Aswa county, Gulu district. Recently, Colonel Godfrey Muheesi, the 4th Division UPDF commander, was in Khartoum to meet with LRM/A officials and Sudanese authorities.The LRA attack took place just a day before the Vice-President, Dr. Specioza Wandira Kazibwe, arrived in Kitgum to represent the President at the consecration and enthronement of the bishop-elect of Kitgum Anglican diocese, the Rt. Rev. Benjamin Ojwang. In a recent summit in Khartoum, Bashir said his government had ended its support to LRA. But Museveni said if Sudan does not take action on Kony, he will do so himself.The war in the north has brought untold suffering and forced many people into camps.Ends