LRA calls for new ceasefire in letter to the UN
By Timothy Nsubuga
13th Sept 2010
Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army [LRA] rebels have once again called for a ceasefire and resumption of peace talks between itself and the government of Uganda.
In a September 6th letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Mr. Justine Labeja Nyeko, who described himself as the acting leader of the LRA/M Peace Team, wrote to the UN saying “…the LRA/M Peace Team now therefore prays [to] the Secretary General of the United Nations Organization to use the considerable leverage of his position in the United Nations and the world to get the governments of Uganda, the DR Congo, Southern Sudan, and Central African Republic to declare a verifiable ceasefire to enable a return to the peace process”.
The LRA also called upon the UN Secretary General to expeditiously appoint a new and more suitable envoy to attend to the critical matter of the peace process for the ‘northern’ Uganda conflict. The LRA, it seems, is also in no doubt about who was responsible for the failure of the Juba Peace talks. As far it is concerned, the government of Uganda was to blame.
“…The Juba Peace Talks which were meant to end the ‘northern’ Uganda conflict were literally shot down by a military onslaught of the army of the GoU [government of Uganda Ed] against the LRA in the north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo” [DRC].
The LRA added that the overall effect of that military offensive “…has been to spread war to the Democratic Republic of Congo, Southern Sudan, and the Central African Republic”.
This latest peace initiative by the LRA may however come as a surprise to many people who followed and observed the Juba Peace talks. Nearly all reports at the time attributed the collapse of the talks to LRA leader Joseph Kony’s failure to show up for the ceremony at which a final peace deal was due to be signed in the Garamba National Park in the DRC.
President Yoweri Museveni, obviously unimpressed by Kony’s failure to show up for the signing ceremony, ordered the Uganda People’s Defence Force [supported by soldiers from Sudan and DRC] to deal with Kony militarily. Thereafter, “Operation Lighting Thunder” was launched in an attempt to wipe out the LRA.
It is believed that “Operation Lighting Thunder” forced the LRA to withdraw to Central African Republic [CAR] where they allegedly committed atrocities against innocent civilians. In its letter to the UN however, the LRA denies committing such atrocities in CAR. On the contrary, the LRA said, the atrocities were committed by ex-LRA soldiers who have been absorbed into the Ugandan army.
“…The Uganda military regime has since absorbed former LRA fighters into its army constituting them into a special unit – called “Battalion 105” – which it misuses to commit atrocities in the central African region in the name of the LRA as a means to demonize it, turn the populations of the zone against it, and deny public empathies to the LRA from the African peoples of this said zone”, the LRA letter reads in part.
In the same letter, it was also clear that the LRA was at pains to try and convince the world that there were two parties to the atrocities committed in northern Uganda. “There has been a general misconception…including by the UN, that the LRA alone is solely responsible for the dirty war that has been the hallmark of the ‘northern’ Uganda conflict and that it is also the LRA that has stubbornly refused to end the conflict by peaceful means”.
These misconceptions, the LRA maintained, “…have been…given currency or disseminated to justify the war policies and programs of the GoU which uses war as a weapon for its political survival”. The LRA also said “…it remains committed to seek, work for and help nurture peace in Uganda”.
If is however fair to say that Kony’s failure to attend the peace signing ceremony in Garamba National Park clearly led many to question the LRA’s commitment to a peaceful resolution of the 25yr old conflict that has claimed of thousands lives in northern Uganda, Sudan, DRC, and Central African Republic. END. If it’s Monday, it’s Uganda Correspondent. Never miss out again!
