Uganda to meet rebels in bid to salvage peace talks

The Ugandan government will meet leaders of the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in mid-July in an attempt to save peace talks that appear dead in the water.

The deputy leader of the government negotiating team, Henry Okello Oryem, said that United Nations special envoy and former Mozambican resident Joachim Chissano and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni have agreed that the meeting with the LRA should take place in Sudan on July 12 and 13.

The LRA says it does not understand the contents of the draft peace treaty, which states its leaders will face war-crimes charges in Ugandan courts rather than in the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Okello Oryem, also Foreign Minister, said that the meeting was aimed at clarifying several points with a view to closing the deal.

Talks began in mid-2006, with the mediation of the southern Sudanese government, to end the brutal war that displaced close to two million people in northern Uganda and left thousands dead, mutilated or abducted by the rebels.

However, the LRA refused to sign the deal earlier this year, demanding that the ICC withdraw the five arrest warrants it slapped on five of its leaders for war crimes.

The group has since been reportedly re-arming and has launched deadly raids in Sudan from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where leader Joseph Kony and his men are holed up in a jungle hide-out.—Sapa-dpa