Sudan renews agreement with Uganda to fight rebels
By Paul Busharizi
BOMBO, Uganda, Oct 3 (Reuters) – Sudan and Uganda have renewed an agreement to cooperate in flushing out rebels from southern Sudan after Uganda accused its northern neighbour of re-supplying the rebels, officials said on Friday.
Uganda’s Defence Minister Amama Mbabazi said he met Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir who agreed to extend the deal allowing the Ugandan army to pursue the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) inside southern Sudan. The agreement expired in September.
“The protocol will be renewed for a longer period than one month,” Mbabazi said without elaborating. “We are happy to say the Sudan government consider the LRA an enemy of Sudan and have resolved to liquidate it.”
It was the ninth extension of the agreement, first signed in March last year.
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni deployed more than 14,000 troops backed by helicopter gunships and tanks against the LRA last year, but the LRA rebels continue to maim, kill and abduct civilians.
Uganda last month accused Sudan of resuming support for the rebels. Khartoum denied the accusations and said it would deal seriously with rogue military officers it suspects were collaborating with the LRA.
“The army officers have been recalled to Khartoum from their commands in southern Sudan and action will be taken against them pending investigation,” Mbabazi told a news conference at the country’s defence headquarters in Bombo, 50 km (30 miles) north of the capital Kampala.
Mbabazi said the LRA have set up three new camps in southern Sudan, two of which are beyond the area that Sudan has allowed Ugandan forces to cross.
“The question of hot pursuit does not arise, we shall answer it when it does,” he said.
The Chief of Military Intelligence, Colonel Noble Mayombo, said government troops killed 186 rebels, captured 27 and rescued 650 abductees in August and September.
The LRA is feared for maiming villagers and abducting children for use as sex slaves and child soldiers. Led by self-proclaimed prophet Joseph Kony, the rebels say they are fighting to overthrow Museveni’s government but have never spelt out detailed demands in public.