Military

09 February 2005

Uganda Sees Best Chance for Peace in 18 Years

Confidence-building measures are having settling effect, NGO official says

By Matthew Pritchard
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- Northern Uganda, which has been torn by decades of fighting between the Ugandan government and the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), has perhaps its best chance for peace in the last 18 years, says the special advisor to the president of the International Crisis Group (ICG), a nongovernmental organization.

John Prendergast, a former advisor on African issues at the National Security Council, said confidence-building measures such as cease-fire negotiations, the reduction in LRA support from the Sudanese government, and a more effective Ugandan Army are beginning to have a settling effect on the region.  He was speaking February 7 at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.

Uganda has had an ongoing civil war for 18 years and as many as 1.4 million people have been displaced in northern Uganda, according to the State Department.  The LRA is held responsible for the violence and for the abduction of children from towns in the north to serve both as soldiers and as sex slaves.

In August 2004 President Bush signed the Northern Uganda Crisis Response Act, which calls for a congressional report in February 2005 detailing the causes of conflict and the sources of support for the LRA.  The United States has also provided more than $13 million to support the reintegration of former child soldiers and other formerly abducted persons and to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Additionally, the United States provided nearly $4 million in emergency non-food humanitarian assistance for FY 2003, and almost $9 million in such assistance for FY 2004.  It also gave $62 million to World Food Program efforts in Uganda, more than 50 percent of total assistance to the country, primarily for a massive feeding program for refugees in northern and eastern Uganda.

The primary obstacle to a realistic peace settlement is the leader of the LRA, Joseph Koney.  Recent interviews by Prendergast with LRA commanders in Uganda who have come out of hiding paint a "bizarre portrait of a man rooted in a grotesquely distorted view of the Old Testament," he said.

Koney believes he is led by God to destroy anyone who collaborates with the Ugandan army, Prendergast said.  "He likens himself to Moses … and like Moses he doesn't believe he'll make it to the Promised Land, which provides a very dangerous ambiguity to whether he will ever let himself personally be part of the peace process."

Meanwhile, the LRA is in "survival mode" because of cuts in its supply lines from Sudan, Prendergast said.  Its members are stealing food and stealing children to make up for those who have been killed in battle.  However, the LRA has "a long track record of bouncing back," he said.

"If Koney were to be killed or captured, the LRA would unravel," Prendergast said.  But to ensure there is not another uprising, other strategies besides military action, such as aid and humanitarian assistance, are key, he said.

Prendergast suggested that one way to encourage members of the LRA to put down their guns would be through the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration program.  The Ugandan government and the World Bank have not yet implemented this program, but must do so soon to further the peace process, he said.

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)