wfn.org | BISHOP URGES PEACE TALKS

[Audrey Whitefield <a.whitefield@quest.org.uk>]

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Feb. 14, 1997 
ANGLICAN COMMUNION NEWS SERVICE
Canon Jim Rosenthal, Director of Communications
Anglican Communion Office
London, England

[97.2.2.7]

UGANDA: ANGLICAN BISHOP URGES PEACE TALKS

(ENI) Uganda's Vice-President, Dr Specioza Windira Kazibwe, has
criticised
an Anglican bishop for urging the Government to hold peace talks with
armed
rebels in northern Uganda.

Addressing a crowd  in the town of Kitgum on 9 February, the
Vice-President
described the leader of the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), Joseph
Kony, and his supporters as "killers, rapists and people who had
devastated
the economy". The LRA is terrorising the towns and villages of northern
Uganda,
killing hundreds of people and abducting teenagers to force them to
become
guerrillas in the struggle for control of the region.

Preaching at a special church service on 4 February after the murder by
the
LRA of  Kitgum District's police chief, Asaph Ruteitsya, the Anglican
Bishop of Kitgum Diocese, Macleord Baker Ochola II, bitterly criticised
President Yoweri Museveni's Government, which has been in power for 11
years, for failing to end the armed rebellion in the north of the
country.

The bishop urged the Government to begin a dialogue with the rebels to
stop
the carnage.

Three weeks ago, members of the LRA, which is allegedly supported by the
Sudanese Government, crossed the Sudanese border into the Kitgum
district
and killed more than 400 civilians, including children, women  and old
people.

"Talking peace with the rebels does not mean the Government is weak or
defeated," Bishop Ochola said, adding that peace talks were the best way
"to stop the killing and displacement of innocent people."   He said
that
granting a pardon to the rebels would be the best means to resolve the
conflict.

The bishop said that the only real rebels were LRA leaders, as most of
the
fighting force now consisted of "so many innocent boys and girls
abducted
from the villages". (According to the Observer newspaper in London,
UNICEF,
the United Nations Children's Fund, estimates that 3000 children have
been
kidnapped by the LRA in the past two years alone.).

"Why does Museveni want to be a monster?" the bishop asked, pointing out
that the north Ugandan Acholi tribe, of which the bishop is a member,
was
the group most affected by the insurgency.  "If he feels he still has
some
more days to rule, he should listen or follow what God wants and not
what
he (Museveni) desires.   For God does not want his people to
live in a state of fear in their country."

Several members of parliament and religious leaders have repeatedly
appealed to the Government to talk peace with the rebels in order to end
the fighting in which thousands of people have been killed, maimed and
expelled from their villages.

President Museveni has said that the relatives of victims of the
fighting
would be angry with the Government if pardons were granted.   The
President
has vowed that Government troops will continue fighting until
they wipe the rebels out.

USA: News Stories see Episcopal News Service online

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