The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has today repeated a threat to keep fighting unless international arrest warrants for their top commanders are scrapped.
LRA leader Joseph Kony and four of his commanders are facing arrest over war crimes indictments against them by the Hague-based International Criminal Court.
LRA spokesperson, Godfrey Ayoo, told Reuters news agency that the Government of Uganda should not expect the rebels to sign a comprehensive peace agreement, only to have their leaders sent to jail in The Hague. He said the LRA leaders are not fools.
Ayoo said that as long as the International Criminal Court indictments still stand, no single LRA soldiers is going to come out of fighting. He emphasized that that position will not change.
The rebel spokesperson was however quick to add that the LRA will remain at the peace talks taking place in Southern Sudan.
The charges against five top LRA commanders are seen as a test case for the young human rights court, but some Ugandans see it as an obstacle to a long-awaited peace deal. President Yoweri Museveni, who wrote to the International Criminal Court last year to request the indictments, has said he would be willing to offer the LRA leaders amnesty from prosecution, but only after a peace deal is signed.
