Army supports using militia to fight rebel group

The Ugandan government has said that its technique of arming militia groups in the eastern Teso region is succeeding in weakening the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebel group. "In the last few weeks, slowly but surely, we are neutralising [LRA leader Joseph] Kony in Teso. By 'neutralise' I mean we are diminishing his means to make war," army spokesperson Maj Shaban Bantariza told IRIN. Bantariza said the Ugandan army, with the help of local militia like the Teso "Arrow Group", had in the last month recovered several hundred guns from the LRA, freed around 900 abductees and killed hundreds of rebel fighters. It was not immediately possible to obtain independent confirmation of this. "We are training a number of militias as zonal forces. We have already trained, passed out and armed six subcounties [the second smallest unit of local government after the village]," he continued. Government spokesman Ofwono Opondo told IRIN the militias were being used mostly for intelligence gathering. "Their main work is to give intelligence and track the movements of suspected infiltrators. The bulk are from Acholi [northern] and Langi [northeastern] tribes so they speak the language of the LRA." Opondo said they were provided with guns so they could defend themselves against the LRA, who were also armed. "We are keeping track of every last bullet we hand out, and at night we take back the guns we give out for safekeeping. Everything is accountable," he said. Uganda's involvement of local militia groups in its war against the LRA has received mixed reactions, with some Members of Parliament and international observers fearing it could be creating future warlords. They say the government’s effort to militarise eastern Uganda is a repeat of mistakes already made in the north of the country. "I know people think these militias are something new," said David Achana, a senior representative of the Acholi Religious Leaders’ Peace Initiative, a group trying to encourage dialogue between the government and the LRA. "But militia groups have been armed in northern Uganda before. They did it in the early 90s. It had very limited success. It was because of it that the LRA started punishing the people of Acholi by chopping off hands and mutilating [them]."