Uganda’s LRA raids villages in southern Sudan

Sept 15, 2005 (KAMPALA) — Uganda’s Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels this week attacked villages and razed thatched huts in southern Sudan, but there were no casualties, United Nations and the region’s administration said on Thursday.

The insurgents numbering about 40 raided the villages, about 49 kilometres east of Yei town near the road to the southern Sudan’s capital of Juba, on Tuesday, said Abebe Hankole, the head of the World Food Programme (WFP) office in Juba.

“They kidnapped three people who were later freed,” he told AFP by phone.

George Riak, an official of Sudan People Liberation Army (SPLA), said it was the first time the insurgents, who have terrified villagers in the region for years, staged attacks west of the River Nile.

“They attacked the areas of Lanya and Loka (and) burnt houses,” Riak told AFP in Kampala.

“They are still moving towards the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo and we still don’t know whether they want to enter DR Congo,” the SPLM official added.

The attack comes weeks after southern Sudan’s administrators allowed villagers to transport food from Yei town to Juba, where thousands of people were facing food shortage.

Last week, Ugandan chief mediator Betty Bigombe said she had re-established contacts with LRA leader Joseph Kony, who expressed willingness to resume peace talks with Kampala.

The LRA took over leadership of a rebellion in northern Uganda in 1988 and vowed to overthrow the government of President Yoweri Museveni and replace it with one based on the biblical Ten Commandments.

The group is, however, notorious for atrocities committed against civilians and abducting villagers as bearers, child soldier conscripts and sex slaves.

The conflict has displaced more than 1.6 million people, who are living in crowded and unhealthy camps in northern Uganda, most of which are prone to attacks.

(AFP/ST)