AFRICA/SUDAN - A Bishop from South Sudan asks international community to protect civilians from Lord's Resistance Army attacks

Khartoum (Agenzia Fides) – Bishop Edward Hiiboro Kussala of Tombura-Yambio, in the State of Western Equatoria (South Sudan), has called for the intervention of the international community in stopping attacks of Ugandan guerrillas of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) on villages in the region.
The Bishop has highlighted that the international community should help protect innocent persons, the majority of whom are children, women, and elderly, from a group that he calls the bands of guerrillas.
The rebels have carried out various attacks on a church in the area, sacking the building. Nearly one month ago, in the attack on the Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace in the city of Ezo, guerrillas kidnapped 17 people, mostly children and adolescents. Bishop Kussala says that shortly after the attack, one of the young people kidnapped was found dead and tied to a tree, with signs of mutilation on his body. Only three of the kidnapped children made it back to their homes.
A week later, on the outskirts of the nearby city of Nzara, six people were ambushed in the forest and killed after being nailed to pieces of wood placed in the ground. The person who discovered the bodies days later compared the scene to a monstrous crucifixion.
The Catholic Church, along with other religions in the State of Western Equatoria organized three days of prayer and fasting to ask for a return to peace (see Fides 7/9/2009).
“Over 20,000 walked over two miles barefoot, dressed in sackcloth and anointed with ashes in a silent protest to the indifference of the government and to promote security in the region,” the Bishop said. “The Ministers of the local government, both in the capital of the state, Yambio, and in Juba, the capital of the Province of South Sudan, took part in the prayerful demonstration and promised to work to reinforce police presence in the region.”
The LRA, which has abandoned North Uganda for some time now, has widened its area of activity to a larger plain that includes northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, and the southern part of the Central African Republic.
Other South Sudan states, in addition to Western Equatoria, are experiencing great tensions due to fighting among local peoples (see Fides 22/9/2009). (Agenzia Fides 23/9/2009)