Sudan asks ICC to issue stay on LRA leader indictments
July 27, 2006 (KAMPALA) — Sudan said Thursday that the International Criminal Court should issue a stay of its arrest warrant for shadowy rebel leader Joseph Kony, whose brutal 19-year insurgency in Uganda has spilled over into Sudan.
Hassan Gadkarim, the Sudanese ambassador to Uganda, said a stay would help the peace talks between Uganda’s government and the rebels that southern Sudanese officials were mediating.
“We should not allow the legal niceties of the ICC to derail the peace process,” he said.
The ICC has pressed Uganda, Sudan and Congo to arrest Kony, fearing the indictment will be ignored during the peace talks.
Kony, who claims mystical powers, was indicted last year on 33 counts, including 12 counts of crimes against humanity for rape and sexual enslavement. The LRA’s political agenda is unclear – Kony has called for Uganda to be governed according to the Bible’s Ten Commandments.
His fighters are known for abducting thousands of children, forcing them to become fighters, porters or concubines. The group has killed thousands of civilians and forced more than a million to flee their homes in Uganda.
Closed-door negotiations between Uganda’s government and the LRA are being held in Juba, the capital of autonomous South Sudan. But indicted rebel commanders have refused to travel to Juba for fear of being arrested.
Southern Sudan is pushing to resolve the insurgency in Uganda because it wants to secure its own territory as it emerges from its own, 21-year civil war.
(ST/AP)