Minister denies signing protocol with Sudan

Ugandan government has denied reports carried by the local media to the effect that it had signed a protocol with the Sudanese government allowing Ugandan troops to fight the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) inside Sudanese territory. Amama Mbabazi, the Ugandan defence minister, told IRIN on Wednesday that the two countries were still in the process of discussing issues concerning their mutual security, but had not signed any defence protocol as a result of the discussions. The New Vision reported on Wednesday that Uganda and Sudan had signed a protocol entitling the Ugandan army to hunt down the LRA inside Sudan. Quoting sources, the government-owned newspaper said two countries had signed the new protocol on 10 March in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, to allow Ugandan soldiers to hunt the LRA, which at one time received backing from the Sudanese government and permission to set up bases in southern Sudan from which to attack northern Uganda. "I told The New Vision that we were engaged in discussions with the Sudan government. The subject of our discussion is our mutual security. And discussions are still going on. I did not talk about the protocol," Mbabazi told IRIN on Wednesday. He added that he would "soon" present a full report to the Ugandan parliament on the "progress of the discussions". According to The New Vision, the 10 March protocol had been signed by Mbabazi, the Ugandan acting army commander, James Kazini, and a Sudanese minister, and was an amendment of an earlier one signed between the two countries on 5 March. The paper said a joint statement by the two countries and the protocols would be issued on Wednesday, 13 March. The first protocol, was also signed in the Sudanese capital, between senior officials of the Sudan People's Armed Forces (SPAF) and the Uganda People's Defence Forces (UPDF), according to The New Vision. "We signed the agreement in Khartoum. Details will be known later," it quoted Mbabazi as saying. The paper also reported that a five-man team from Sudan had already been dispatched to Uganda to oversee the UPDF operations against the rebels in northern Uganda . The Ugandan military recently stated that it had received permission from the Sudan government to pursue and fight the LRA in southern Sudan, and announced on 2 March that it had killed some 80 rebels as a result, according to media reports. A UPDF spokesman said up to 1,500 army troops had penetrated about 20 miles (about 30 km) over the border with Sudan, the US-based United Press International (UPI) reported on Tuesday. The campaigns followed recent violent attacks in Apac, Gulu and Kitgum districts, apparently by the LRA or elements associated with it. The Sudan government had confirmed the Ugandan operations against the rebel group in southern Sudan, that these were conducted in "full coordination and agreement" with Khartoum, and that they were in conformity with agreements signed between the two countries, AFP reported, also on Tuesday. "What is happening along the Sudanese-Ugandan border is taking place in coordination and full agreement between the two countries, and in line with a specific agreement in the interests of Sudan and Uganda," the agency quoted Sudanese Foreign Minister Mustafa Uthman Isma'il as saying. "These agreements were reached during President Museveni's visit to Sudan [in January] and in the course of the last IGAD [Inter-Governmental Authority on Development] summit, which was held in Khartoum [also in January]. So what is going on now is a joint agreement and is a follow-up from both countries, and we believe it is going in a direction which will serve the interests of both countries," he added. Uganda's pursuit of the LRA rebels into Sudan was also covered by Article 51 of the UN Charter, which allows countries to pursue "their enemies" into another's territory up to a distance of 50 km from the border, the UPDF spokesman, Shaban Bantariza, told IRIN recently. The LRA, led by Joseph Kony, has fought Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni's secular government since 1988, from bases in southern Sudan, ostensibly to establish a rule based on the Biblical Ten Commandments. The US in December included the group - as well as the rebel Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) operating in western and southwestern Uganda - on its "Terrorist Exclusion List". LRA operations have included the killing and abduction of civilians, the looting of people's goods and destruction of their homes, to the extent that humanitarian officials have described its actions as a war against the civilian population, and not the Kampala government. The group has abducted nearly 10,000 children, to be used as soldiers, sex slaves, or porters for looted goods, and thousands of them are believed to have died in captivity, according to United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). A registration system supported by the agency had put the number of abducted children still missing at 5,555, UNICEF said in a statement released on 5 March. The statement expressed concern that the renewed fighting in northern Uganda in the past few weeks, after nearly two years of relative calm, could put thousands of children and young people at risk. "The abduction of children by the LRA is an intolerable situation that has dragged on for years," said Carol Bellamy, the executive director of UNICEF. "It is time for the LRA, as well as those that have influence with the LRA, to bring about the safe, immediate and unconditional release of these children." The LRA presence in southern Sudan strained relations between Uganda and Sudan, resulting in a diplomatic break in 1995, with each country accusing the other of supporting its rebel groups. Subsequently, under an accord signed by the two countries in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, under the auspices of US former President Jimmy Carter, in December 1999, both undertook to stop supporting each other's rebel groups, and to restore diplomatic relations. They also agreed to work towards the return of the Ugandan children and adults abducted by the LRA over the years. However, military sources have said that although the LRA has lost the backing of the Sudanese government, a militia calling itself the Equatorial Defence Force, armed by Khartoum to fight Sudanese rebels in the south of the country, has now become the LRA's main backer, according to AFP.