Uganda welcomes Lubanga conviction
Congolese former rebel leader Thomas Lubanga listens to the verdict at the ICC in the Hague yesterday. He was found guilty of crimes of conscription and enlisting children. PHOTO BY afp
What you need to know:
The International Criminal Court found the former Congolese warlord guilty of abuse of human rights and using children - the court’s first verdict since its birth 10 years ago.
Kampala
Government yesterday welcomed the guilty verdict handed down by the International Criminal Court against former Congolese warlord, Thomas Lubanga, for recruiting and using children as soldiers between 2002 and 2003.
Foreign Affairs State Minister Henry Oryem-Okello said Uganda was happy with the judgement but cautioned that the ICC “has to work hard” not to be seen as a coercive tool against Africans.
“Whereas, we welcome the process, the ICC must try to correct the impression that it’s targeting only African leaders,” Mr Okello-Oryem said.
At the height of the brutal Lendu-Hema ethnic conflict in eastern DR Congo’s Ituri region, Lubanga’s Union of Congolese Patriots political group and its armed wing, the Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo, was linked to elements within Ugandan forces based there before switching sides to become a reported proxy of the Rwandan army.
His conviction is the court’s first verdict since it was set up 10 years ago. Lubanga was arrested in 2005.
It is not immediately clear what precedent this conviction sets for officers of the armies of Rwanda and Uganda who at various times backed different fighting groups in DR Congo, some of whom have been accused in UN reports of committing gross human rights abuses including rape, torture and wanton mass killings.
In 2003, Lubanga’s forces surrounded current Inspector General of Police Lt. Gen Kale Kayihura, then a brigadier commanding UPDF troops in Bunia.
Before his death, former army commander, the late Maj. Gen. James Kazini, had told a military court which was trying him for causing financial loss to the army, that he spent Shs66m of military resources to deploy forces to rescue Gen. Kayihura during the Lubanga attack.
Justice earned
Yesterday, Anneka Van Woudenberg from US-based Human Rights Watch said steps should be taken to bring Lubanga’s co-accused before court - and others responsible for similar crimes in DR Congo.
“If those investigations are properly done that will of course take us to Uganda, Rwanda and also to Kinshasa,” she said.
When asked whether some UPDF officers would suffer the same fate for supporting groups like Movement for the Liberation of Congo under Jean Pierre Bemba, Army Spokesperson Felix Kulayigye said UPDF never asked these armed groups to commit crimes against humanity.
“Yes, we supported Bemba. But we didn’t tell him to go and commit the crimes. UPDF has never committed any crime against humanity. They were not doing us a favour not to mention us. Don’t think that every person who puts on a dress is a woman. We are of different calibre,” he said.
Col. Kulayigye said the UPDF’s intervention actually helped the Lendu, who largely supported Lubanga and the Hema to stop fighting that left scores dead.
Other rights activists, meanwhile, criticised prosecutors for not charging Lubanga with sexual violence crimes, despite allegations that women and girls were raped and abused by his forces.
“The Prosecutor’s office must review its strategy adopted in the Lubanga case,” said Michael Bochenek of Amnesty International. (Related story: Pg30)
