Sudan primate calls for help against the LRA: CEN 3.06.09 p 7.

The Primate of the Sudan, Archbishop Daniel Deng of Juba has called upon Britain and the United States to intervene in the conflict in East Africa and end the depredations of the Lord’s Resistance Army.

Speaking to the BBC last week, Archbishop Deng said the governments of South Sudan, Uganda, the Congo and the Central African Republic appeared unable to end the 20 year reign of terror of the LRA. International support from the West was needed to capture LRA leader Joseph Kony and “bring him to book.”

On Dec 14 elements of the Ugandan, Congolese and South Sudan armies, supported by Ugandan jet aircraft, launched operation ‘Lightning Thunder’, attacking LRA base camps in the Garamba forest of the Bas Uélé district of the Congo. The strikes came after Kony failed to appear at a Nov 29 meeting to sign a final peace agreement.

The US Army’s African Command seconded 17 military advisers to the Ugandan People’s Defence Force for ‘Lightning Thunder’ according to a report in the New York Times, and also provided equipment, satellite intelligence and the jet fuel for the Ugandan air force. Last month Israel’s Ambassador Jacob Keidar told the Kampala Monitor that his government also would offer military or intelligence support to defeat the LRA.

“The LRA rebels are committing the most terrible crimes to human beings and I really think they should be gotten rid of,” Mr. Keidar told the Monitor, saying his government will consider “positively, very favorably” requests for assistance.

Northern Ugandan church leaders, however, have urged restraint. In December, the former Anglican Bishop of Kitgum, the Rt Rev Macleod Ochola speaking on behalf of the Acholi Religious Leaders Peace Initiative said ‘Lightning Thunder’ would only scatter the LRA and prolong the conflict. Twenty years of campaigning had not defeated the LRA the bishop said, urging the government to return to the negotiating table.

Driven from the Congo’s Garamba forest by ‘Lightning Thunder’, the LRA has moved east over the past ten weeks unleashing a campaign of terror against the South Sudan with reports from local church leaders of destroyed crops and villages, murder and kidnappings.

On Feb 28, the Diocese of Ezo in South Sudan wrote to supporters in the UK detailing LRA attacks in its area. The Diocesan Administrator, Levi Bona, stated that in March 2008 the LRA attacked Ezo and ransacked the diocesan headquarters.

They returned on Dec 26 and in six separate incidents, attacked villages surrounding Ezo, burning crops, destroying homes and killing 16. One village headman-”the husband of one of our Mother’s Union members”-was hacked to death by the LRA and Mr. Bona reported that over 9,000 people have been driven from their homes. Almost 7000 Congolese refugees have taken shelter in Ezo since a Dec 25 massacre at a Catholic church killed 425.

“Seven parishes have been greatly affected and the tendency of Sunday services is now very low because people fear to be attacked by LRA during prayers, Mr. Bona said.

Refugees in Ezo “are sleeping under trees, have nothing to eat or cover with, medicine and all the basic needs are needed. We thank the UN for the little support they have taken to the Congolese refugees recently but the internal displaced persons have not yet receive any help,” he said.

Mr. Bona appealed to “our Christian brothers and sisters for support in form of food, non food items and medicine on behalf of these suffering people.”