Sudan, Uganda to investigate human rights violations in the South
July 24, 2006 (KAMPALA) — Uganda and Sudan have agreed to investigate alleged gross human rights abuses by Ugandan soldiers in southern Sudan. Capt Paddy Ankunda, the spokesman for the Uganda delegation at the ongoing peace talks in the Southern Sudanese capital, Juba, revealed this to Daily Monitor yesterday.
The investigation would be the first response to allegations by southern Sudanese communities that Ugandan army soldiers engaged in improper acts in Sudan.
At the start of the Juba peace talks, which are now in their second week, chiefs and clerics speaking for several southern Sudanese communities presented a document that made damming claims against the UPDF. The document titled “Reconciliation with the Ugandans” accused the UPDF of deliberately attacking civilians and claimed that both the LRA and UPDF acts of civilian abuse “were and still are intentional”.
Although the report had far more damming evidence against the LRA, it accused the UPDF of perverting its mission in southern Sudan.
“For example, instead of following and attacking the LRA, they turned their guns to the civil population, shooting, looting, raping and burning their huts in pretext of chasing the LRA,” the 4-page report said.
“For example, 10 people in Lulobo were killed, also in Madi area two people were killed and others wounded in the process. At Kitire in 2004, the UPDF killed the three escorts assigned to lead them to the hideout of the LRA.” But Kampala, which has always defended the UPDF’s human rights record, maintains that the allegations against the UPDF have not been documented before.
“We have a liaison officer in Juba who should have been addressing these problems but we are very surprised that none was brought to his attention. But still we are going to make sure those responsible for these acts are brought to book,” Ankunda said.
(The Monitor/ST)