Sudanese militia to fight Ugandan rebels

KAMPALA, April 24, 2004 (Xinhua) — A Sudanese militia based in southern Sudan has vowed to wage an all-out war against the Ugandan rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in apparent retaliation for its attacks on civilians inside the Sudan, according to Ugandan newspaper Sunday Monitor.

The Equatorial Defense Force (EDF), a militia formerly allied to the LRA, which also based in southern Sudan, said in a statement it issued with the Sudanese government over the weekend that it will take the war against the LRA rebels to all their hide- outs in south Sudan.

“We shall smoke LRA rebels in their holes and they will be killed like rats when they run out,” the EDF said in the statement signed by its secretary-general Charles Kisanga.

The EDF asked Uganda to help fight against the LRA, which has been fighting an 18-year-old war to topple the Ugandan government.

Since last month the Ugandan government forces have been pursuing the rebels in southern Sudan to flush them out after securing a green light from the Khartoum government.