A Roman Catholic priest on Sunday criticised the Ugandan army’s use of helicopter gunships during operations against rebels, saying many children abducted by the insurgents had been killed in such raids.
The rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), which is active in several districts of northern Uganda, frequently abducts children and forces them to fight against government troops or carry out attacks on civilians.
”Children who have managed to escape during battles with the UPDF (Ugandan army) tell horror stories about scores of kids being killed by the helicopter gunships, a method which is taking a heavy toll of innocent victims,” the priest, Carlos Rodriguez, who is involved in efforts to end the insurgency told AFP in a telephone interview.
The LRA has been battling President Yoweri Museveni’s secular government since 1988, ostensibly to replace it with an administration that would enforce the Biblical 10 Commandments.
The group is, however, notorious for its atrocities against civilians.
The Ugandan army has in recent weeks resorted to the use of helicopter gunships to strafe rebel positions. On Saturday, the Ugandan army claimed that it had killed at
least 40 LRA fighters when it attacked them with helicopter gunshsips in the Laporo subcounty of the northern Pader district.
In report last month, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said the number of children kidnapped by the LRA had risen sharply in recent months.
The US-based watchdog group said that 5 000 children had been seized by the LRA since June 2002 to serve as child soldiers, compared with fewer than 100 during the whole of 2001. – Sapa-AFP