Uganda said on Friday it would pull its troops out of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) at the end of the month, ending their deployment as part of a three-nation operation against Ugandan rebels.
Ugandan troops, deployed alongside Congolese and south Sudanese forces in the north-east of the country following attacks on civilians by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) would be withdrawn ”at the end of February”, said Congolese government spokesperson Lambert Mende.
The operation was launched on December 14 but has so far failed to capture LRA rebel leader Joseph Kony.
”We estimate that they will not have anything more to do here,” Mende said, adding that Congolese police, troops and UN peacekeepers would continue the operation.
Congolese and Ugandan officials met in Kinshasa on Wednesday and Thursday to decide on their next move. Several diplomatic sources told Agence France-Presse (AFP) the Congolese government opposed extending the military offensive.
Uganda’s army spokesperson, Deo Akiiki, had said on February 14 that it was ”just a matter of time” before the LRA was finally defeated.
”Operations will … go on until Kony’s terrorists are routed out of DRC,” he said.
Troops from DRC, Uganda and South Sudan have been involved since mid-December in a major joint operation against the LRA in the region, which extends along DRC’s borders with Sudan and Uganda.
The unprecedented military drive against the hold-out rebel group was launched after Kony — wanted by the International Criminal Court over a raft of alleged war crimes — repeatedly failed to show up at signing ceremonies for a peace deal the government inked in April 2008.
The joint raid has targeted LRA camps in remote parts of the DRC but has provoked retaliatory raids by the rebels against the local civilian population, officials and rights groups say.
More than 865 civilians had been killed by the LRA between mid-December 2008 and mid-January 2009 in the north-west region of DRC, according to a report by Human Rights Watch. — AFP
