AFRICA/CENTRAL AFRICA - Important member of Lord's Resistance Army captured in Central Africa

Bangui (Agenzia Fides) – An important commander of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has been captured by the Ugandan Army in southern Central African Republic. Mickman Opuk was the security guard for Joseph Kony, leader of the LRA, a group of guerrillas begun 20 years ago in northern Uganda, and which in recent years have rampaged through a vast area which includes northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and the southern Central African Republic.
The group is sadly known for its atrocities against civilians, especially the kidnapping of children who are forced to join their own ranks. Opuk is accused by Ugandan authorities of having participated in an April 1995 massacre of over 200 people in Atiak, in the Gulu District of northern Uganda.
Opuk was captured two weeks ago. His arrest has only been made known now, for “operational and intelligence reasons,” Ugandan military leaders affirm. The national army was authorized by the authorities in Bangui to intervene in Central African territory to hunt down Kony and his men. The Ugandan military also have similar agreements with the leaders of the DRC and South Sudan. In particular, in December 2008, the armies of Uganda, the DRC, and South Sudan, launched a joint military offensive in northeastern Congo, on the general headquarters of Kony. However, Kony managed to escape the attack and his men reacted by carrying out a series of retaliation attacks on civilians in Congo and South Sudan, until reaching Central Africa, a country that is hundreds of kilometers from Uganda (i.e. they share no common geographic boundary).
The persistence of the LRA, a movement banned by all the countries of the world and formed mainly by child-soldiers, remains a mystery. After over 20 years, in spite of efforts on the part of the Ugandan Army (one of the most efficient in Africa), and forces from other countries, not only has the LRA not been detained, but it has widen the area in which it spreads death and destruction. As a guerilla movement with little to survive on, it begs the question whether along with the accumulation of goods stolen from the sacking of towns, there might also be someone offering logistic support to the organization. And if so, to what end? (LM) (Agenzia Fides 10/9/2009)