Nairobi
23 June 2008
The reclusive leader of Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army rebel group,Joseph Kony, has said peace talks with the Ugandan government shouldresume. Derek Kilner reports from VOA's East Africa bureau in Nairobi.
Joseph Kony delivered his comments in a rare interview with Radio France International on Sunday.
"Asthe chairman of the Lord's Resistance Army I want these peace talks toresume back again to Juba," he said. "I want to go to table back againto Juba and I need also not to fight again with Uganda government."
Adelegation from the Lord's Resistance Army had been negotiating withthe Ugandan government, under the mediation of Mozambique's formerpresident Joachim Chissano and the vice president of thesemi-autonomous government of southern Sudan, Riek Machar. By April,the two sides had drafted a peace agreement, but the talks collapsedafter Kony failed to turn up for a meeting to sign the agreement.
Sunday's interview provides Kony's first public comments since the failed meeting.
"Mymain message to the people of Uganda is this: 'Me, as the chairman ofthe Lords Resistance Army I am the one who called peace talks, so I amnot going to refuse anything about this,'" he said. "And I am agreeingto continue dialogue until we finish everything and I am not going togo back to war with the Ugandan government. "
In response to theapparent failure of the peace process, the governments of theDemocratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, and southern Sudan agreed tolaunch a joint military operation against the Lord's Resistance Army. The wisdom of the military approach appeared to be bolstered afterLord's Resistance Army rebels attacked southern Sudanese troops earlierthis month.
But southern Sudan's Riek Machar says he is willing to resume negotiations.
"Thisis a good step forward that he has come out to say he would want thepeace process to continue," he said. "I am looking to receive a callfrom him. Already the leader from his team has rang me in the morningand I told him that once General Joseph Kony rings me we will make thearrangements for him to come to Juba."
Ugandan military spokesman Paddy Ankunda said he also welcomed the resumption of peace talks.
"Whatwe want is peace. If he can gives us a shortcut by accepting to signthe agreement that is welcome," he said. "We will wait and see. If heis serious he will turn up, if he is not, he will not. He had bettercome himself, but if he can give us any authentic mediators ordelegates we will work with whoever can take us to that signature."
JosephKony and his top deputies are wanted by the International CriminalCourt for war crimes. The two-decade conflict has spread from NorthernUganda into Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the CentralAfrican Republic.