UN: Ugandan-led SLA restarts terrorising attacks of ‘killing, abduction, maiming’ in south Sudan.
YAMBIO – A surge in rebel attacks in southern Sudan by the Christian extremist Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) rebels is creating grave concern, a senior UN official said on Friday.
“Many innocent people are losing their lives every week, and the United Nations is very concerned about the killing, abduction, maiming and displacement of innocent civilians,” said Ameerah Haq, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Sudan.
The Ugandan-led LRA began its campaign of brutal guerrilla raids two decades ago, but has launched a fresh wave of attacks terrorising a vast swathe of land across several nations.
The guerrilla group aims to establish a theocratic government in Uganda, based on the Christian Bible and the Ten Commandments.
Their ferocious extremist attacks, with Christian rebels chopping off the limbs and lips of their victims, were often aimed more at the civilians they said they fought for than at the military.
The LRA’s top Christian extremist leaders — fugitives from the International Criminal Court — are accused of having forcibly enlisted child soldiers and sex slaves, and of slaughtering tens of thousands of people.
The radical Christian group is still enslaving children.
There is “grave concern” about the “increasing number of deaths due to the escalating attacks,” Haq said during a visit to Western Equatoria state, which has suffered the brunt of many raids with several villages burnt.
“During the last six weeks alone, 11 incidents of LRA attacks have been reported — seven of them in the first week of September,” she told reporters.
Rebels raided villages just five kilometres (three miles) from Yambio last week, while the UN was forced to airlift out aid workers from the remote town of Ezo in August following a raid.
“The worsening humanitarian situation in Western Equatoria state demands a long-term solution to the LRA insurgence,” Haq added.
The rebels have also attacked settlements in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and in the Central African Republic (CAR).
Security needs to be increased, especially to guard deliveries of food aid which is acting as a “magnet” to the rebels, Haq added.
Ugandan soldiers began a military operation in December on remote rebel bases in the DRC after peace talks failed, triggering a wave of brutal attacks as LRA fighters scattered and launched reprisal raids.
More than 200 people have been killed and upwards of 130 abducted since December in south Sudan by the LRA, according to UN estimates.
Western Equatoria is struggling to cope with some 68,000 people who have fled their homes and over 18,000 refugees, mainly from neighbouring DRC.
LRA rebel chief Joseph Kony, who began his battle over 20 years ago, is said to have named one of his sons “George Bush” in 2006.
Ugandan soldiers began a military operation in December on remote rebel bases in the DR Congo after peace talks failed — triggering a wave of brutal attacks as Christian extremist LRA fighters scattered, carrying out reprisal raids.
More than 230,000 people have fled their homes in south Sudan since late 2008 as a result of the Christian militant LRA, according to UN estimates.
In addition, more than 25,000 refugees from the DR Congo and the Central African Republic (CAR) have arrived seeking shelter.
But the attacks continue.
Since late July, more than 180 people have been killed in radical LRA attacks in south Sudan and the numbers of refugees and displaced are rising, said Lise Grande, the UN’s top humanitarian official for southern Sudan.
“The LRA continues to wreak havoc” she said.
“The picture does not look very good. Violence is continuing in the DR Congo and CAR, raising the concern of future displacements and increased numbers of refugees,” she added.
Many fear that after a period of relative calm the Christian extremist rebels are regrouping, attacking to secure fresh recruits and to replenish supplies.
The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has warned of an “unprecedented” wave of attacks in the DR Congo — with 55 attacks in July alone in the north-eastern Orientale province.
“Some 360,000 Congolese have been uprooted in successive LRA attacks in the Orientale province in north-eastern DR Congo,” according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
“The levels of fear are incredibly high,” said Katharine Derderian, a humanitarian advisor for the aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) just back from an assessment in DR Congo.
“People are too scared to even send their children to school, because they fear the LRA will attack.
Analysts warn there will be no easy solution.
“A few LRA fighters can paralyse and scare an entire population,” said Louise Khabure, of the International Crisis Group think tank.
Some 1,270 people have been killed and over half a million people uprooted from the province by the violence since September 2008.