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Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army deputy chief Vincent Otti, seen here in July 2006. Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army rebels asked South Africa to join efforts to mediate faltering peace talks with the Ugandan
government aimed at ending two decades of fighting.
(AFP/File) |
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Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels asked South Africa to join efforts to mediate faltering peace talks with the Ugandan government aimed at ending two decades of fighting.
The announcement from LRA supremo Joseph Kony, through his deputy Vincent Otti, came a day after the rebels won a 72-hour break in peace talks with the government in order to mourn the death of a top commander -- and International Criminal Court fugitive -- killed by the army over the weekend.
In a statement, Otti said South Africa had a successful track record in conflict resolution in Africa.
"I, Lieutenant General Vincent Otti, deputy chairman of the high command and second in command of the Lord's Resistance Army do hereby appeal to the government of the Republic of South
Africa to come and act as co-mediator," he said.
He said South African mediation would complement the efforts of the government of southern Sudan in the ongoing peace talks, which are taking place in southern Sudan.
Face-to-face talks are expected to resume on Friday, when the insurgents will declare their stand on accountability and reconciliation.
Officials said the rebels chose South Africa in order to exert pressure on Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's government to be serious in efforts to end the insurgency that has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced more than two million others.
In addition, they argued that the chief mediator, southern Sudan Vice President Riak Machar, "was not new in the Ugandan peace process," and thus there was fear of bias, according to an unnamed official.
The LRA has warned that Uganda's refusal to match its unilateral truce, its insistence that the rebels disarm and
surrender, as well as its death threats to top commanders, were stymieing the talks.
"In order for the Juba negotiations to be meaningful, successful and binding, the (LRA)... calls upon the government of Uganda to respond positively and declare a cessation of hostilities and respect the agenda and code of conduct agreed upon by the negotiating parties, the mediators and facilitators," Otti explained.
The Ugandan government insists any truce agreement with the rebels will be at the end of the peace process, arguing that the insurgents would take advantage of a cessation of hostilities to regroup, re-arm and recruit new fighters.
Last October, the ICC issued arrest warrants for Kony, Otti and three top commanders for war crimes, including hacking of civilians, rape of women and killings at displaced people's camps since the LRA took over a two-year-old insurgency in 1988.
But over the weekend, the army said it had killed Major
General Raska Lukwiya in northern Uganda, reducing the of fugitives to four.
On Wednesday, meanwhile, the Ugandan army said troops had killed four rebels, including a commander allegedly involved in last year's slaying of a British tourist in northern Uganda.
Army spokesman Lieutenant Chris Magezi said Reagan Akena, a junior LRA commander and three fighters were killed in an ambush on Monday in Amuru district.
"(Akena) was responsible for the killing of Steve Wills, the British tourist who was killed in Murchison Falls Park in November," the spokesman said.
Three New Zealanders were also injured in the November attack after rebels opened fire on their vehicle.
Kony, a self-proclaimed prophet and mystic who says he speaks directly to God, purports to be fighting to replace Museveni's government with one based on the Biblical Ten Commandments.
But the LRA has become better known for atrocities,
particularly the kidnapping of an estimated 25,000 children -- girls for sex slaves and boys for fighters.
Several previous peace efforts have failed and the Juba talks are seen as the best chance yet to end the conflict that the United Nations and humanitarian groups say is one of the the world's worst and most forgotten humanitarian crises.
