Ugandan rebel chief negotiator wants Bashir’s ICC indictment suspended

By James Gatdet Dak

August 21, 2008 (JUBA) — The Ugandan rebels of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) chief negotiator in the stalled Southern Sudan’s mediated Juba peace process, David Nyekorach Matsanga, on Wednesday said President Al-Bashir of Sudan’s indictment by the International Criminal Court (ICC) is an obstacle to peace in the Sudan.

Speaking to journalists at Juba International Airport shortly before his plane took off to Nairobi, Kenya, Matsanga said Beshir’s indictment by ICC is an obstacle to peace in Darfur as in the same way LRA’s leader Joseph Kony’s indictment and warrant of arrest by the same court is an obstacle to peace in northern Uganda.

Kony was charged of war crimes and crimes against humanity for allegedly responsible for brutal killings, maiming, raping and abduction of people, some young children, in a war that has spilled over to some neighboring countries.

Matsanga called for suspension of the ICC’s indictments to both President Al-Bashir and Joseph Kony to give peace a chance.

On the stalled Juba peace process, Matsanga said the process would resume soon, but he could not reveal a specific date for the resumption. He also said the agreement needed some sort of scrutiny or certain items needed some clarifications in the final draft of the agreement before they could ink it.

Matsanga was not specific on whether the items were related to the ICC’s indictments of LRA leadership and how they would continue to affect the signing of the Final Peace Agreement.

In a statement over the BBC on Tuesday, the United Nations Secretary General’s Special Envoy for LRA affected areas, Joachim Chissano was reported to have been contacted by Joseph Kony who requested for resumption of the peace process.

Chissano who was the former President of Mozambique reportedly said the process would resume within the next one to two weeks.

The peace process witnessed a setback in mid April this year when the LRA leader refused to sign the final text of the agreement, citing ICC’s warrants of arrest hanging over his head and his two other colleagues as an obstacle.

The rebels have been waging the war in northern Uganda for 21 years, claiming to have been fighting against marginalization of the people of Northern and North-eastern Uganda by the Kampala-based regime.

Analysts describe the Juba peace process, which is mediated by the Southern Sudan’s Vice President, Riek Machar as the best chance to end this brutal war that has claimed tens of thousands of lives, displaced nearly two million people and still poses a security threat regionally.

(ST)

(ST)