UN council presses Uganda rebels to free abductees

Nov 16, 2006 (UNITED NATIONS) — The U.N. Security Council on Thursday put new pressure on Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army rebels to immediately release all women and children abducted during two decades of civil war.

A statement approved unanimously by the 15-nation council also called on both the Ugandan government and the LRA to “commit themselves fully” to a long-term and peaceful solution to the conflict.

Both the Ugandan government and the LRA signed a new truce this month, raising hopes for a quick agreement in talks in the Sudanese city of Juba that aim to end 20 years of brutal war in northern Uganda.

The LRA, which claims to want to rule Uganda according to the Biblical Ten Commandments, has become notorious for massacring civilians, mutilating survivors and abducting thousands of children as fighters, porters and sex slaves.

The fighting has killed about 100,000 people and driven nearly two million from their homes and into camps, the council statement said.

Despite the truce, LRA leader Joseph Kony refused a request from U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland on Sunday to quickly release noncombatants and the sick and wounded.

The council statement asked the 192 U.N. member-states both to support efforts to end the fighting and “to ensure that those responsible for serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law are brought to justice.”

Diplomats said the statement marked the first time the council had formally expressed its support for bringing to justice LRA leaders responsible for war crimes.

Richard Dicker of New York-based Human Rights Watch said his organization welcomed the action as a council commitment “to bring about both peace and justice” in northern Uganda.

The International Criminal Court in The Hague last year issued war crimes indictments against five LRA commanders, but the group’s leaders have said they will not make peace until the court drops charges against them.

(Reuters)