Ugandan rebels threaten Sudanese peace process
By James Palmer, THE WASHINGTON TIMES
LOBONE, Sudan, April 22, 2004 — Cmdr. Wilson Deng battled government forces for two decades in southern Sudan before a cease-fire was achieved in 2002 and negotiations began to end one of Africa’s long-running wars.
Now a rebel group from northern Uganda threatens the approaching peace with new fighting in southern Sudan.
“We cannot wait for the enemy to attack,” said Cmdr. Deng, 48, a Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) leader in the Equatoria region, referring to the Ugandan rebels. “We must destroy them.”
Sudan is the largest country in Africa. Achieving peace across its 800,000 square miles and 36 million people is complicated. The lengthy battle has pitted the Islamist government against the mainly Christian or animist south.
The Arab-oriented government in Khartoum and the mainly black, Christian SPLA are preparing to sign a peace accord in Kenya to end their long war, which has killed an estimated 1.5 million people and displaced 4 million.
A cease-fire was announced last week to end a separate, yearlong insurgency in the Darfur region of western Sudan that has uprooted hundreds of thousands in that impoverished desert region.
But another conflict in southern Sudan further complicates the picture as Sudanese militias and Ugandan government forces pursue the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in southern Sudan’s Imatong Mountains.
The LRA has terrorized northern Uganda for 17 years in its quest to overthrow President Yoweri Museveni and rule the country by the Ten Commandments.
LRA members have abducted more than 30,000 children age 17 and younger, using boys as porters or indoctrinating them to kill civilians, and sexually enslaving adolescent girls to LRA commanders.
According to the Refugee Law Project, a human rights group based at Makerere Law School in Kampala, Uganda, about 150 LRA commanders lead 200 core fighters, while the bulk of the rebel group is made up of roughly 3,000 children, most of whom lack guns.
Joseph Kony, a primary-school dropout and self-styled mystic with dozens of wives and children, leads the LRA, which the U.S. State Department declared a terrorist organization in November 2001.
The rebels hide in the mountains and forests near the town of Torit in southern Sudan, where they plan and undertake attacks into northern Uganda.
The Equatoria Defense Force (EDF), one of about 25 Khartoum-backed militias in southern Sudan, announced last month it would work with the Sudan People’s Liberation Army to destroy the Lord’s Resistance Army.
Sudan’s president, Lt. Gen. Omar Bashir, had previously supported the LRA to counter Mr. Museveni’s support of SPLA forces in southern Sudan, but Mr. Bashir has twice allowed the Uganda People’s Defense Force (UPDF) to enter southern Sudan in pursuit of the LRA since entering negotiations with the SPLA in 2002 to end the country’s 20-year civil war.
Mr. Deng, based in the village of Lobone in the foothills of the Imatong Mountains less than 10 miles from the Ugandan border, doubts Khartoum has stopped supporting the LRA
“They’re still attacking,” he said in an interview at his camp in Lobone. “Where else are they getting the ammunition from if the [Khartoum] government isn’t giving it to them?”
Jim Terrie, a senior analyst of East African affairs for the International Crisis Group, based in Nairobi, Kenya, said Mr. Bashir’s cooperation with Uganda has undercurrents of self-interest.
“It’s a win-win situation for him to cooperate – and be seen cooperating – knowing that he is able to ensure that there is no lasting damage to the LRA,” Mr. Terrie said in an e-mail. This is enhanced by deficiencies in the UPDF, and the fact the [government of Sudan] and LRA know where they are going.”
The border between northern Uganda’s Kitgum district and Lobone in Sudan is porous and unclear, with no demarcation or soldiers from either side posted in the area.
The LRA uses the thick bush in northern Uganda and mountain passes in southern Sudan to move between the two countries, but the site of many of its attacks has been along the road from northern Uganda into Lobone – a major route for humanitarian assistance.
LRA attacks on aid organizations have disrupted food distribution in and around Lobone – a makeshift town of 31,000 people, mostly ethnic Dinka displaced from their homes during Sudan’s civil war – which lacks electricity or running water and depends heavily on humanitarian assistance.
Nearly 40 percent of the people in some parts of southern Sudan are malnourished, according to the United Nations, double the average rate in the rest of the country.
Catholic Relief Services – a U.S.-based aid group that delivers up to 1,650 tons of food throughout southern Sudan every month, including 143 tons to Lobone – has been a prime target for LRA ambushes.
“Our delivery schedule is affected because our movement is limited,” said Resom B. Habte, a Lobone field officer for the charity. “When a food convoy is attacked, we have to turn back.”
No deterrence to LRA attacks was visible along the road from northern Uganda to Lobone on a recent morning, except for a few Ugandan soldiers on foot, some apparently unarmed.
The Ugandan rebels jeopardize the return of thousands of displaced persons to southern Sudan, and they continue to force more people from their homes.
Malony Akau Nai, 54, the senior administrator in Lobone, said the Ugandan rebels are prolonging the suffering among the southern Sudanese after two decades of civil war.
“The war has destroyed the people,” Mr. Nai said. “The LRA pass the mountains in the area, and cross back to Uganda and displace more of the local villages in the mountains.”
Sgt. Jacob Yol, 31, an SPLA combatant since 1984, said the Ugandan rebels attack when their supplies are low.
“When they need food, they come here just to loot us,” Sgt. Yol said in his Lobone office. “They are disturbing our peace.”
Back at his camp, Mr. Deng, the SPLA commander, vowed to crush the Ugandan rebels to further the prospective peace settlement with the Khartoum government and bring peace to southern Sudan.
“We will hunt down the LRA,” Mr. Deng said. “We want to finish cleaning our house.”