Karamojong group attacks presidential guard

Armed Karamojong pastoralists on Thursday attacked guards protecting Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni at the end of his two-week mission to oversee a disarmament programme in the Karamoja subregion, northeastern Uganda, news agencies reported. "The ambush happened yesterday and I saw the Tata lorry which was shot at. The [helicopter] gunship has just flown the [three] injured officers to Kampala for treatment," the government-owned New Vision newspaper on Saturday quoted Moroto Resident District Commissioner John Abingwa as saying. Museveni claimed that the guards, members of the Presidential Protection Unit (PPU), had ignored his instruction to be on "extra alert", the reported stated. "The Karamojong did good to wake them up because they were asleep," he added. Museveni has been in the Karamoja subregion for much of the last two weeks overseeing a disarmament programme aiming to remove some 40,000 illegal firearms from the area. The attack took place at Kamusalaba junction on the Moroto-Nakapiripirit road, some 25 km from where Museveni was camped, the BBC reported on Sunday. Museveni has now concluded his mission in Karamoja but will return to the area in February to assess progress in the disarmament exercise, according to reports. The Karamojong have been widely criticised for carrying out armed cattle raids against neighbouring districts in eastern Uganda, most notably in Katakwi District where some 80,000 people have been forced into - and to remain in - displacement camps. The BBC on Sunday quoted [unnamed] Ugandan military commanders as saying that the appeal to hand in illegally held guns had been met with an overwhelming response, with 4,300 weapons handed in since the disarmament exercise began on 2 December. The Karamojong had originally been given one month to surrender their weapons, but the amnesty period was subsequently extended to six months following consultations between Museveni and local tribal leaders, Ugandan Presidential spokeswoman Mary Okurut told IRIN on 7 December. The Ugandan government initially provided weapons to small groups of "home guards" within the Karamoja subregion on the grounds that the Karamojong were under threat from cross-border raids by the Turkana and Pokot pastoralist groups from neighbouring Kenya. In return for disarmament, Museveni has pledged to protect the Karamojong from such attacks by deploying troops along the border. Hundreds of Karamojong men have volunteered to join Local Defence Units (LDUs), which the government is planning to place under the control of the Uganda People's Defence Force (UPDF) to patrol the border with Kenya, according to the BBC. Museveni has also undertaken to start developing the marginalised Karamoja subregion - by building schools, organising immunisation programmes and rewarding all those that hand over their guns with oxen in the next financial year - if the disarmament programme is successful.