Lord's Resistance Army

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Lord's Resistance Army
Participant in the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency,
First Sudanese Civil War and Second Sudanese Civil War
Active 1987-present
Leaders Joseph Kony
Vincent Otti†
Raska Lukwiya†
Okot Odhiambo
Dominic Ongwen
Odong Latek†
Headquarters Northern Uganda
Strength 500-3,000[1]
Originated as Holy Spirit Movement
Uganda People's Democratic Army
Allies Sudan (1994-2002)
Opponents Flag of Uganda Uganda People's Defence Force
Sudan People's Liberation Army
Flag of the Democratic Republic of the Congo Military of DR Congo
Flag of the United Nations MONUC[2]

The Lord's Resistance Army (also Lord's Resistance Movement or Lakwena Part Two) is a sectarian guerrilla army based in northern Uganda.

The group was formed in 1987 and is engaged in an armed rebellion against the Ugandan government in what is now one of Africa's longest-running conflicts. It is led by Joseph Kony, who proclaims himself the "spokesperson" of God and a spirit medium, primarily of the Holy Spirit, which the Acholi believe can represent itself in many manifestations.[3] The group adheres to a syncretistic[4] blend of Christianity, Mysticism,[5] Islam,[6] Ugandan traditional religion,[7] and witchcraft,[8] and claims to be establishing a theocratic state based on the Ten Commandments and Acholi tradition.[9][10][3][11] The LRA is accused of widespread human rights violations, including murder, abduction, mutilation, sexual enslavement of women and children, and forcing children to participate in hostilities.[12] The LRA operates mainly in northern Uganda, but also in parts of Sudan and DR Congo.[13][14]

The LRA is currently proscribed as a terrorist organization by the United States.[15]

Contents

[edit] History

Main article: Lord's Resistance Army insurgency
 Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page. (June 2008)

The LRA has been known by a number of different names, including the Lord's Army (1987 to 1988) and the Uganda Peoples' Democratic Christian Army (UPDCA) (1988 to 1992) before settling on the current name in 1992. They are also sometimes referred to as Lord's Resistance Movement/Army (LRM/A or LRA/M). Some academics have included the LRA under the rubric Lakwena Part Two. For simplicity's sake, this article refers to all of these various manifestations as the "Lord's Resistance Army".

According to UPDF spokesman Lt. Col. Shaban Bantariza, mediation efforts by the Carter Center and the Pope have been spurned by Kony.[16]

[edit] Ideology

The LRA's ideology is largely mysterious due to a lack of communication on the subject, and it is disputed amongst academics.[16][17] The LRA reportedly evokes Acholi nationalism on occasion,[18] but the sincerity of this behavior is considered dubious by some observers.[19][20]

Robert Gersony, in a report funded by United States Embassy in Kampala in 1997, concluded that "the LRA has no political program or ideology, at least none that the local population has heard or can understand."[21] The International Crisis Group has stated that "the LRA is not motivated by any identifiable political agenda, and its military strategy and tactics reflect this."[22] IRIN comments that "the LRA remains one of the least understood rebel movements in the world, and its ideology, as far as it has one, is difficult to understand."[16] UPDF Lt. Col. Shaban Bantariza has said that "you can't tell whether they want political power. Its only aim is to terrorise and brutalise the civilian population and to loot their homes."[16]

During an interview with IRIN, Vincent Otti was asked about the LRA's vision of an ideal government, to which he responded "Lord’s Resistance Army is just the name of the movement, because we are fighting in the name of God. God is the one helping us in the bush. That’s why we created this name, Lord’s Resistance Army. And people always ask us, are we fighting for the [biblical] Ten Commandments of God. That is true – because the Ten Commandments of God is the constitution that God has given to the people of the world. All people. If you go to the constitution, nobody will accept people who steal, nobody could accept to go and take somebody’s wife, nobody could accept to innocently kill, or whatever. The Ten Commandments carries all this."[11]

In a speech delivered by James Alfred Obita, former Secretary For External Affairs And Mobilisation, and Leader of Delegation of the Lord's Resistance Army, he adamantly denied that the LRA was "just an Acholi thing" and stated that claims made by the media and Museveni administration asserting that the LRA is a "group of Christian fundamentalists with bizarre beliefs whose aim is to topple the Museveni regime and replace it with governance based on the Bible's ten commandments" were false.[23]

In the same speech, Obita also stated that the LRA's objectives are:

  1. To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people.
  2. To fight for the immediate restoration of competitive multi-party democracy in Uganda.
  3. To see and end to gross violation of human rights and dignity of Ugandans.
  4. To ensure the restoration of peace and security in Uganda.
  5. To ensure unity, sovereignty and economic prosperity beneficial to all Ugandans
  6. To bring to an end to the repressive policy of deliberate marginalization of groups of people who may not agree with the NRA ideology.

[edit] Troop strength

The government of Uganda claims the LRA has only 500 or 1,000 soldiers in total, but other sources estimate that there could be as many as 3,000 soldiers, along with about 1,500 women and children.[1] The soldiers are organised into independent brigades of 10 or 20 soldiers.[1] Sudan has provided military assistance to the LRA, in response to Uganda lending military support to the SLA.[24]Sudan has stopped aiding the LRA since 2002.

[edit] ICC arrest warrants

Number of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), and IDPs as a percentage of total population in northern Ugandan districts (based on data from 2004).
Lord's Resistance Army
insurgency
Events

1987–1994
1994–2002
2002–2005
Juba talks
2008–
Related articles

Lord's Resistance Army
Holy Spirit Movement
Alice Auma
Joseph Kony
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The International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants on 8 July and 27 September 2005 against Joseph Kony, his deputy Vincent Otti, and LRA commanders Raska Lukwiya, Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen. The five LRA leaders are charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder, rape, sexual slavery, and enlisting of children as combatants. The warrants were filed under seal; public redacted versions were released on 13 October 2005.[25] These were the first warrants issued by the ICC since it was established in 2002. Details of the warrants were sent to the three countries where the LRA is active: Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The LRA leadership has long stated that they would never surrender unless they were granted immunity from prosecution; so the ICC order to arrest them raised concerns that the insurgency would not have a negotiated end.[26]

On 30 November 2005 LRA deputy commander, Vincent Otti, contacted the BBC announcing a renewed desire among the LRA leadership to hold peace talks with the Ugandan government. The government expressed skepticism regarding the overture but stated their openness to peaceful resolution of the conflict.[27]

On 2 June 2006, Interpol issued five wanted person red notices to 184 countries on behalf of the ICC, which has no police of its own. Kony had been previously reported to have met Vice President of Southern Sudan Riek Machar Footage of this meeting can be viewed here http://www.journeyman.tv/56380/short-films/meeting-joseph-kony.html.[28] The next day, Human Rights Watch reported that the regional Government of Southern Sudan had ignored previous ICC warrants for the arrest of four of LRA's top leaders, and instead supplied the LRA with cash and food as an incentive to stop them from attacking southern Sudanese citizens.[29]

At least two of the five wanted LRA leaders have since been killed: Lukwiya on 12 August 2006[30] and Otti in late 2007.[31] Odhiambo was rumoured to have been killed in April 2008.[32]

[edit] Christmas massacres

Main article: 2008 Christmas massacres (Congo)

On December 28, 2008, the Ugandan army accused LRA rebels of hacking to death 45 people in a church in northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo.[33] An aid official speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity confirmed Friday's massacre, saying the killings took place in a Catholic church in the Doruma area, around 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the Sudanese border. "There are body parts everywhere. Inside the church, the entrance and in the church compound," the aid official said. "We got information the rebels cut 45 people into pieces," added army spokesman Captain Chris Magezi.

Caritas International estimated the number of victims to be about 485. Caritas said that the LRA attacked a concert organised on December 25 for Christmas in Faradje and again the following morning, killing about 150 people altogether. Caritas said that LRA also killed 75 people in a church north of Dungu and burnt the church, killed 48 people in Bangadi, and 213 people in Gurba.[34] The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimated the death toll as 189 in Faradje, Doruma and Gurba.[34]

Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon stated that he "condemns in the strongest possible terms the appalling atrocities reportedly committed by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in recent days".[35] Caritas International said that it was "shocked by its staff reports" of the massacres.[36]

[edit] Bibliography

  • Green, Matthew (2008). The Wizard of the Nile: The Hunt for Africa's Most Wanted. Portobello Books. ISBN 978-1846270307. 

[edit] See also

Sister project Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Lord's Resistance Army

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b c IRIN (2 June 2007). UGAND-SUDAN: Ri-Kwangba: meeting point . Accessed on 10 June 2008.
  2. ^ ReliefWeb » Document » Guatemalan blue helmet deaths stir Congo debate
  3. ^ a b Ruddy Doom and Koen Vlassenroot (1999). Kony's message: A new Koine? The Lord's Resistance Army in northern Uganda. 98. Oxford Journals / Royal African Society. p. 5-36. 
  4. ^ Haynes, Jeffrey (2002). Politics in the developing world. Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 121. ISBN 978-0631225560. 
  5. ^ McLaughlin, Abraham (2004-12-31). "The End of Uganda's Mystic Rebel?". Christian Science Monitor. Global Policy Forum. http://www.globalpolicy.org/intljustice/wanted/2004/1231mystic.htm. Retrieved on 2009-03-04. 
  6. ^ Marc Lacey (2002-08-04). "Uganda's Terror Crackdown Multiplies the Suffering". New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F07E1DA123BF937A3575BC0A9649C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all. 
  7. ^ Muth, Rachel (2008-05-08). "Child Soldiers in the Lord’s Resistance Army: Factors in the Rehabilitation and Reintegration Process". George Mason University: 23. http://hdl.handle.net/1920/3005. Retrieved on 2009-03-04. 
  8. ^ Johnson, J. Carter (January 2006). "Deliver Us from Kony". Christianity Today 50 (1). http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/january/18.30.html. Retrieved on 2009-02-28. 
  9. ^ Martin, Gus (2006). Understanding Terrorism: Challenges, Perspectives, and Issues. SAGE. pp. 196–197. ISBN 978-1412927222. 
  10. ^ Spencer, Robert (2007). Religion of Peace?: Why Christianity Is and Islam Isn't. Regnery Publishing. pp. 108–108. ISBN 978-1596985155. 
  11. ^ a b "Interview with Vincent Otti, LRA second in command" and " A leadership based on claims of divine revelations" in IRIN In Depth, June 2007
  12. ^ International Criminal Court (14 October 2005). Warrant of Arrest unsealed against five LRA Commanders. Accessed on 10 June 2008.
  13. ^ JAMES C. MCKINLEY JR. (April 1, 1996). "Uganda's Christian Rebels Revive War in North". New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9B0DE2DA1039F932A35757C0A960958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1. 
  14. ^ "Uganda to continue Congo LRA hunt". BBC. March 5, 2009. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7926173.stm. 
  15. ^ Philip T. Reeker (December 6, 2001). "Statement on the Designation of 39 Organizations on the USA PATRIOT Act's �Terrorist Exclusion List�". U.S. Department of State. http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2001/6695.htm. 
  16. ^ a b c d "UGANDA: Nature, structure and ideology of the LRA". IRIN. http://www.irinnews.org/InDepthMain.aspx?InDepthId=23&ReportId=65772. Retrieved on 2009-03-18. 
  17. ^ "Meeting Report: Day 3", Africa, 2007 Consultation, Kibuye, Rwanda: Quaker Network for the Prevention of Violent Conflict, 2007-03-29 - 2007-04-02 
  18. ^ Fraser, Ben (2008-10-14). "Uganda's aggressive peace". Eureka Street 18 (21): 41–42. http://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=8936. Retrieved on 2009-03-18. 
  19. ^ Chatlani, Hema. "Uganda: A Nation In Crisis" (PDF). California Western International Law Journal 37: 284. http://californiawestern.edu/content/journals/Chatlani.pdf. Retrieved on 2009-03-18. 
  20. ^ Ghana, C. (2002-08-09). "Don't Praise The Lord". Africa Confidential 43 (16). 
  21. ^ Gersony, Robert (August 1997), "Results of a field-based assessment of the civil conflicts in northern Uganda" (PDF), The anguish of northern Uganda, Kampala, Uganda: USAID 
  22. ^ "Northern Uganda: Understanding and solving the conflict", ICG Africa Report N°77, Nairobi/Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2004-04-14 
  23. ^ Obita, James, "The Official presentation of the Lord's Resistance Movement/Army (LRA/M)", A Case for National Reconcilation, Peace, Democracy and Economic Prosperity for All Ugandans, Kacoke Madit 
  24. ^ Otunnu, Ogenga (August 1998). "The Path to Genocide in Northern Uganda". Refuge 17 (3): 7. https://pi.library.yorku.ca/ojs/index.php/refuge/issue/view/980. Retrieved on 2009-03-04. 
  25. ^ Situation in Uganda, International Criminal Court
  26. ^ Court moves against Uganda rebels, BBC, 7 October 2005
  27. ^ Ugandans welcome rebel overture, BBC, 30 November 2005
  28. ^ Interpol push for Uganda arrests, BBC News, 2 June 2006
  29. ^ Regional Government Pays Ugandan Rebels Not to Attack, Human Rights News, 3 June 2006
  30. ^ International Criminal Court (7 November 2006). Statement by the Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno‐Ocampo on the confirmation of the death of Raska LukwiyaPDF. Accessed on 10 June 2008.
  31. ^ BBC News (23 January 2008). Uganda's LRA confirm Otti death. Accessed on 10 June 2008.
  32. ^ BBC News (14 April 2008). Ugandan LRA rebel deputy 'killed' . Accessed on 10 June 2008.
  33. ^ BBC News (29 December 2008). Ugandan LRA 'in church massacre'.
  34. ^ a b Mukasa, Henry (2008-12-30). "Uganda: Kony Rebels Kill 400 Congo Villagers". allAfrica.com. 
  35. ^ Ugandan rebels kill 400 in DR Congo: charity, Yahoo, 30-12-2008
  36. ^ "Congo-Kinshasa: Caritas Reports Christmas Day Massacre by Ugandan rebels". allAfrica.com. 2008-12-30. 

[edit] External links

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