US intensifies search for Kony

Endgame blueprint: Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebel leader Joseph Kony declined to sign a peace pact with Uganda government, but his reported Central African Republic hideout is on the radar and could be hit by regional armies anytime.

KAMPALA

The American government is building up military and diplomatic pressure on the LRA and pin-pointed Central African Republic as the likely present location of Joseph Kony, the rebels’ elusive leader.

This newspaper has learnt of intensified US-led activities that peaked this week with AFRICOM head, Gen. Carter Ham, declaring in Washington on Tuesday they will “in the very near future” increase the number of American military advisers and trainers to help African countries combat the rebels. The US has already trained a battalion of Congolese government forces and is reported to be in talks with Kinshasa to offer military training to another.

In Kampala, US Ambassador Jerry Lanier, for two days ending Wednesday, hosted envoys from Central African Republic and South Sudan in a closed-door meeting with Uganda’s Chief of Defence Forces, Gen. Aronda Nyakairima, to hammer out what is believed to be a final push to eliminate LRA threat and its leaders.

Uganda, DRC and South Sudan are the original tripartite partners that jointly launched the December 2008 military offensive, code-named Operation Lightning Thunder, which has significantly diminished the capability of LRA and resulted in the killing or capture of many of its top commanders.

Kony and his band of mainly abducted fighters terrorised much of northern Uganda from 1987 until August 2005 when the UPDF flushed them out and they fled to eastern DRC, but spread out later to unleash mayhem across parts of South Sudan and Central African Republic.

Invisible Children, an American NGO that works to highlight LRA atrocities and assist victims, says the rebels have this year alone killed around 140 civilians and abducted 600, justifying why immediate action is necessary to further disable the rampaging group and end its brutality against unarmed civilians.

Senior Washington and AFRICOM officials as well as top UPDF generals Katumba Wamala (Land Forces Commander) and Jeje Odong (State Defence minister) attended the Tuesday and Wednesday secret counter-LRA discussions at the US Mission in Nsambya, a Kampala suburb.

Others present included Ambassador Robert Loftis, the acting coordinator, Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilisation; Mr Lawrence Wohlers, who is the US Ambassador to the Central African Republic, and America’s Charge d’Affaires to South Sudan, Mr Christopher Datta.

The US embassy in a statement noted that Amb. Lanier hosted the conference to, among other things; outline his government’s support to the regional effort, reportedly spearheaded by the Ugandan military, to counter the LRA disturbances.

It provided “valuable opportunity for participants to plan and coordinate US support across the region, as it relates to security partnerships, civilian protection, humanitarian assistance, and encouraging defections and reintegration of former fighters,” according to the Wednesday press release sent by Information Assistant, Ms Dorothy Nanyonga.

US aid
The US government has to date provided $23 million (Shs64.4b) worth of non-lethal equipment and logistical support to Operation Lightning Thunder (OLT), renamed Rudia II since UPDF’s partial withdrawal from eastern DRC.

In a brief sent at this newspaper’s request, the US, which has in the past offered military intelligence support as well as surplus Department of Defence equipment, including transport trucks, to the UPDF, announced its commitment to continue its logistical support to this operation.

The UPDF remains the most effective national military pursuing the LRA, the US embassy concluded. It is understood the heightened US involvement is within a regional framework specified in the Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act of 2009, which President Obama signed into law in May last year, to, among other things, eliminate LRA threat, guarantee civilian protection and provide funding for reconstruction of northern Uganda.