Gerson on Kony

Michael Gerson has a column today on the hunt for African terrorist Joseph Kony:

There is a natural and appropriate hesitance to wish death for any man. "Many that live deserve death," warned J.R.R. Tolkien. "And some die that deserve life. Can you give that to them? Then be not too eager to deal out death in the name of justice." It is a wise saying -- with some notable exceptions. And one of those exceptions is Joseph Kony, who has dealt out death to so many.

This is the first time I've ever praised Gerson's writing, and it might be the last, so please read the whole thing. And please, if you can, do something to help the Angels of East Africa missionary orphanage.

Kony's slaughter in Congo

The Washington Post reports:

A Ugandan rebel group known for its horrific cruelties has massacred 189 people and kidnapped at least 20 children over three days in northeastern Congo, U.N. officials reported Monday.
The cultlike Lord's Resistance Army carried out the attacks on three villages between Thursday and Saturday, according to Ivo Brandau, a spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa.
The group killed 40 people in the small town of Faradje on Thursday, and over the next two days, it attacked the villages of Doruma, where rebels massacred 89 people, and neighboring Gurba, where 60 were killed, Brandau said, citing reports that the United Nations received from local authorities.

This report by Stephanie Crummen deserves especial praise for these two paragraphs:

Although the Lord's Resistance Army is associated with the political grievances of the Acholi people of northern Uganda, the group has mostly terrorized the Acholis over the past 20 years, proving to be more of a psychotic cult than a true rebellion. Its reclusive, messianic leader, Joseph Kony, claims to consult spirits and says he aims to establish a theocracy based on the Ten Commandments.
Over the years, however, his movement has earned a reputation as one of the most brutal groups on the continent, sexually enslaving young girls, abducting children and forcing new recruits to machete friends to death during induction ceremonies. The group has killed or disfigured more than 10,000 people -- cutting off victims' lips was a trademark -- and abducted more than 20,000 children, as well as forced more than 2 million people to flee their homes, rights groups say.

Press accounts routinely refer to the LRA as "rebels," which is sort of like calling Charles Manson a "youth adviser." The LRA is, and always has been, a terrorist organization. The Post and Crummen deserve praise for pointing this out.

UPDATE: A report in Uganda's New Vision indicates some of the fleeing LRA have already made it into South Sudan. Doruma is very close to the three-way junction of the borders of Congro, South Sudan and the Central African Republic. It seems obvious that the Dec. 14 joint attack on Kony's base in the Garamba National Park caused the LRA to split up, fleeing in different directions, some heading north and west toward Doruma, others heading east toward Faradje and the Sudanese border.

UPDATE II: Meryl Yourish invokes a comparison between the slaughter in Congo and the situation in Gaza:

I have yet to hear of a special UN Security Council meeting being convened to discuss the crisis in the Congo, where innocent men, women, and children are being murdered for no apparent reason.

Well, yeah. But I don't know if this is an appropriate analogy. Compared to Kony and the LRA, Hamas looks like a Boy Scout troop. (I've actually met two young survivors of an LRA raid.) If anything, the world's willingness to ignore the LRA's horrific savagery bespeaks . . . racism.

Khartoum still aiding Kony?

The end may be near for Joseph Kony, the African terrorist who has wrought horrible carnage in Uganda and Sudan. Ten days ago, Uganda, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo united in a military raid that destroyed the Congo hideout camp of Kony's "Lord's Resistance Army," which has terrorized the region for 20 years.

Experts on the LRA have long suspected that the Sudan government in Kharthoum had armed and supported Kony's killers in order to destabilize Uganda and undermine the efforts of South Sudan (predominantly Christian) to gain autonomy from the Muslim govenrment in Kharthoum.

In an interview with Uganda's New Vision newspaper, Ugandan Gen. Aronda Nyakairima discussed the LRA raid and suggested that Khartoum may still be aiding Kony:

Of course, it was Khartoum that continued supporting LRA, otherwise we would have defeated them long ago.
When they stopped because of Juba being under the South Sudan government, they were no more.

In other words, once South Sudan (with their capital in the key transportation center of Juba) gained autonomy in 2005, this cut off Kony's supply line to Khartoum. But when asked who is now arming Kony, Nyakairma says:

We don't have intelligence to point at a country X or Y. But one wonders whether the old friends washed their hands clean. I can't prove that. But studying what we captured will tell it all. It is also possible he was disarming people in the CAR. He also raided South Sudanese soldiers and there are hunters in Garamba. He could have picked guns here and there. But we can't rule out supplies from his old friends.

"His old friends" = Khartoum. Fortunately, after two years of fruitless peace negotiations with the LRA, the United Nations Security Council is now fully supporting the military effort to hunt down Kony, who is charged with crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court.

More terrorism by Kony

Joseph Kony's LRA terrorists have struck again, this time in South Sudan:

The South Sudanese army (SPLA) clashed with a group of LRA fighters at Nimule, on the border with Uganda, on Sunday, according to UN sources. The SPLA reportedly killed three members of the LRA and captured one. . . .
[Ugandan army] spokesperson Capt. Chris Magezi . . . confirmed the presence of an LRA group in Pageri, 40km north of the Ugandan border, over the weekend.
"On Saturday night, around 30 LRA fighters attacked the village of Pageri. They looted food and abducted two people, a man and a woman. The woman was later released," Magezi said yesterday.
According to army intelligence, the group crossed the River Nile again on Sunday night.
"They moved in the direction of Kajo Keji, heading back towards Garamba National Park (in the eastern DR Congo)," Magezi said. "We think they came to get weapons and food."

The Rev. Sam Childers, whose Angels of East Africa missionary orphanage is at Nimule, reports that the orphanage is safe. Childers is seeking contributions to fund his next trip to Sudan.

Although the Ugandan army is ready to go after the LRA, the spineless State Department continues to urge negotiations with Kony's gang of thugs. Kony's LRA has mercilessly killed, kidnapped and mutilated Ugandan and Sudanese civilians, sending hundreds of thousands fleeing as refugees. If a terrorist had done this to Americans, would we be negotiating?

Kony: Is the end near?

The latest news from Africa points toward a final end for mass-murderer Joseph Kony and his LRA terrorists:

The Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) is set to attack Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army rebels, Southern Sudan trade minister Anthony Makana has said.
He made the remarks on Saturday after the LRA attacked an SPLA detachment in Nabanga, killing 23 people, including 14 SPLA officers and a local chief in the nearby Yamba town. The attackers reportedly headed towards the Ugandan border after the incident.

Negotiations for the LRA's surrender broke down in March, because International Criminal Court officials refused to grant amnesty to Kony and other top LRA leaders accused of human rights violations. After the latest attack, South Sudan -- which had been brokering the negotiations -- said no more talk:

"It would be unreasonable for the Government of South Sudan to continue [with the mediation]," said Mr Gabriel Changson Cheng, the GoSS information minister.
Mr Cheng, who spoke to Radio France International (RFI), said the decision to withdraw his government's mediation was brought about by several other factors including the attack itself. "[The LRA] are the ones abrogating the peace process," he said, adding that the other party to the talks, the Uganda government, was equally disinterested.

Kony and his thugs have been hiding in a remote area of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Now they are reportedly roving about the borderlands again:

Suspected rebels of the Lords Resistance Army are moving towards the Ugandan border, after raids at the Congo-Sudan border towns on Wednesday and Thursday, an official has said.
The attacks in Nabanga and Yamba, about 20 kilometers apart left at least 21 people killed, including six children, southern Sudan Army Spokesman Major General Peter Parnyang said Saturday.
The rebels also killed a local chief in Yamba before disappearing. "They are moving along the border; they are moving towards Kajo-Keji," Maj.Gen Parnyang told this Correspondent Saturday.
Kajo-Keji, at the Sudan-Uganda border, lies about 400 kilometers south east of Nabanga, the area where the rebels were expected to converge during the stalled Uganda-rebel peace talks.

At last, Uganda's leaders appear to have had enough of negotiations:

Addressing the Ugandan parliament on 5 June, President Yoweri Museveni said his army was ready to flush the LRA out of its bases in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) if the Congolese government and the UN gave his country the go-ahead.
"I can assure all of you Ugandans that [LRA leader Joseph] Kony cannot disturb the peace in northern Uganda given the nature of professionalism of the Uganda Peoples Defence Forces (UPDF). We now have sophisticated equipment and are ready to respond," the president said.
"Since Kony is in Congo, it is now the responsibility of [DRC President Joseph] Kabila and the UN to call on us," he told the legislators. "In case Congo asks for our assistance, we are ready and prepared to go and destroy him."

Here's hoping they get the green light.

Uganda aids South Sudan

Important news from Uganda:

The government of South Sudan is discussing a deal in which the country’s students in Ugandan public universities will pay the same tuition as their counterparts.
Yesterday, the South Sudanese media reported that this was one of the issues President Salva Kiir discussed with President Yoweri Museveni during his two-day visit here last week.
“I have signed with the Uganda president to allow all our students to pay the same tuition fees as their natives,” Kiir told Sudanese students at the Imperial Resort Beach Hotel in Entebbe on Friday. . . .
It was, however, not clear whether the deal applied to private universities. Uganda has five public universities: Makerere, Kyambogo, Mbarara, Busitema and Gulu. The arrangement is part of the cooperation that includes pacts on transport and communication, health, culture and the media.

This cooperation between Uganda and South Sudan is a very positive step toward peace and prosperity in the region.

South Sudan (also known as "New Sudan") won autonomy from Khartoum after a 22-year civil war that ending in 2005. That war was caused by radical Islamicist elements in the Khartoum government, which sought forcibly to impose sharia law throughout Sudan. The Christians in southern Sudan -- under the leadership of Col. John Garang -- fought back and paid a heavy price for their freedom. Many from the South were carried away in slavery to the Islamic North, and atrocities were widespread. Khartoum sided with Saddam Hussein after he invaded Iraq in 1990; For five years (1991-96), Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda were based in Sudan.

One consequence of the long civil war was that it produced what has been called a "lost generation" of Sudanese who have had little or no formal education. Among the South Sudan war veterans I met during my February trip to Africa were some who joined the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) as young as 11.

However, I'm not sure that "lost generation" phrase -- with its overtones of hopelessness -- is entirely fair to the Sudanese. These veterans (such as my Dinka friend Santino, shown in the photo) are Christian men with the kind of personal dignity that befits such military heroes. Their long years of army discipline will surely make them valuable citizens in peace.

Nonetheless, the opportunity for South Sudanese students to attend Uganda's universities at standard tuition will be a tremendous aid to South Sudan's efforts to rebuild its economy and civil society.

The Remarkable Museveni

The mention of Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni in this Monday news story gives me an opportunity to discuss this amazing historical figure. Museveni has been controversial and he definitely has his critics (a Kenyan man who attends our church is one of those critics), but what he has accomplished in Uganda is truly remarkable.

Given that Museveni came to power 22 years ago as the result of a successful "war of liberation," it would be easy for Westerners to think of him as just another of the "strong man" rulers who have been so common in post-colonial Africa. It would be easy to think that, but it would also be ignorant and wrong to do so.

While in downtown Kampala with Sam Childer's assistant, "Nineteen" (his African name sounds exactly like "Nineteen" in English), I visited a street market and asked a used-book vendor if he had a recent history of Uganda. The vendor sold me, for a modest sum, a 1990 paperback book called Mission to Freedom: Uganda Resistance News, 1981-85.

I didn't realize it at the time -- not until I got back to the States and tried to find it online -- but there in that street market, I had purchased quite a rare volume. Mission to Freedom is a collection of original dispatches from what might be called the "underground newspaper" of the National Resistance Movement, which was then an outlaw guerrilla resistance effort against the dictatorship that ruled Uganda.

A very brief history: When Uganda gained its independence in 1962, a guy named Obote became the prime minister. In 1966, Obote effectively made himself dictator and pursued a socialist economic policy, with predicably bad results. Obote's dictatorship was dependent on the support of the military. In 1971 (again, predictably) the military decided it didn't need Obote, so while he was out of the country, there was a coup that installed as the new dictator Obote's longtime military henchman, Idi Amin. Of course, Amin became one of the most heinous dictators in history. He was finally deposed in 1979, and in 1980, Obote returned to power in an election that was widely considered fraudulent.

Museveni had been one of the Ugandans who went into exile in Tanzania during Amin's dictatorship, and was a key figure in the alliance of Ugandan exiles and Tanzanian army troops that deposed Amin. After Obote's fraudulent election, Museveni went into the countryside and organized a resistance movement. In February 1981, Museveni led a daring raid on a Ugandan military installation, seizing weapons and equipment, thus starting the five-year "war in the bush" that eventually made Museveni president.

OK, standard Third World "war of liberation" stuff, right? So it seems, until you read Museveni's declarations of his principles, written during the war, as reprinted in Mission to Freedom.

Though he had been a campus Marxist leader in the late '60s, and had written his senior thesis on the nihilistic intellectual Franz Fanon, clearly Museveni's worldview had changed in the intervening decade -- probably from the experience of watching the dictatorship of Amin in action. Museveni's writings in Mission to Freedom deal chiefly with military and political affairs, but he also condemns tribalism and "backwardness," and emphasizes "the rule of law" and "economic revitalization."

If he were an American academic, the Museveni of Mission to Freedom would be right at home at a Cato, AEI or Heritage seminar. As I was reading this book, I had the distinct impression that at some point Museveni had spent part of his exile reading Hayek.

Museveni & Uganda today

Uganda's gross domestic product ranks 13th in Africa, although a good bit lower (24th among 59 African nations) when calculated on a per-capita basis. However, considering that it is a relatively small landlocked country, considering that it has only recently suppressed the terrorist depradations of Joseph Kony, and considering that its northern neighbor Sudan has been embroiled in civil war so long, Uganda's economic situation is very good.

Uganda's economic situation is especially good if you keep in mind the historic context: First, the socialist insanity of the Obote regime, then the barbaric despotism of Amin, and then the five-year guerrilla war that brought Museveni to power in 1986. Recovering from such a history takes a long time. Even if Uganda's per-capita GDP of $1,800 a year doesn't sound impressive (although it's double the per-capita GDP of neighboring Tanzania), the country has obviously made great strides, and the stability of Museveni's government is a big reason for that.

Politically, Museveni's government has held true to its declaration during its "resistance" years, seeking to eliminate "backwardness" and discourage tribalism.

Like many of my conservative friends in America, I understand tribalism as being in some sense intrinsic to the human experience, and I suspect some of my America friends will look askance at the phrase "discourage tribalism." Trust me, friends: What the Ugandan government is doing is perfectly Burkean. I'd need 5,000 words to explain it, but it's a good thing.

I could (and eventually plan to) write a lot more about Museveni's policies, but it's getting late, so let me just give you one brilliant example. This is a photo I took of a roadside sign near downtown Kampala put up by the Uganda election commission:

"For Democracy, Reject Ignorance: Listen, Analyze and Choose." I don't know about you, but I'd sure like to see some signs like that in America.

Finally, to any of my American friends who might wish to visit Uganda, let me offer some travel advice:

• Fly British Airways. They're the best, and you'll just love listening to the crew speak with those cool Brit accents.
• Don't get freaked out by all the recommended vaccinations. Get the shots, but don't get the idea that you're heading to a rendezvous with certain death. Also, beware of medication interactions. About four or five days into my trip, I stopped taking my anti-malaria medicine because of the weird side effects.
• Also, don't get freaked out by the "traveler's advisories" from the State Department. The U.S. State Department is evidently run by a bunch of neuraesthenic, agoraphobic, hypochondriac scaredy-cats who get paid to convey the official U.S. government position that a trip to Uganda is a rendezvous with certain death.
• After arrival at Entebbe Airport, take the shuttle bus to the Kampala Serena Hotel. It's a five-star resort, located adjacent to the central government offices in downtown Kampala, and thus within a security perimeter similar to what you'd find at the White House or the Capitol. It's $375 a night, but wait until you see the fabulous gardens, the beautiful swimming pool with its dramatic waterfall, the poolside cafe, the dinner buffet, et cetera. We visited the Serena mainly to use their business center and Wi-fi service, but I also got a bit of leisure relaxation time there. It's excellent.
• Of course, smart travelers know never to drink tap water or any beverage with ice in a foreign country. The bottled water in Uganda is fine (Perrier is available), but if you prefer stronger beverages, allow me to recommend Bell Lager, a fine Ugandan beer.
• For shopping, I recommend the Garden City Mall in downtown Kampala -- it's the only mall I've ever seen that also includes a casino. I didn't visit the casino, but I did visit an ice cream shop, clothing store, grocery store and Internet cafe at the mall. Internet service in Uganda is much slower than what I used to in the States, but the Internet cafe at the mall had a connection as fast as the one in the business center at the Serena Hotel, for a lower cost.
• Your first day in Uganda, study the currency and exchange rate, so (a) you've got some idea what things actually cost, and (b) you'll be able to properly tip waiters, bellhops, etc. You will find that if you make a point of learning the name of your waiter your first day at the place, and give him a healthy tip (i.e., 20%), your service on all subsequent nights will be excellent. (Of course, this is true wherever you travel; I'm just pointing out that this principle applies in Africa, too.)

Return of The Muzungu

OK, I'm back from Africa and trying to decompress from the intensity of the experience. Some of the stuff that happened seems like a wild fever dream at this point.

Africa was great. Kampala, the capital of Uganda, is lovely in February, and any tourist will be assured a splendid time if, after landing at Entebbe International Airport, he catches the shuttle bus to the luxurious Kampala Serena Hotel, a five-start resort to compare with any in the world. (If you're down at the poolside lounge, your waiter might be my friend Robert. Tell Robert to bring you a cheeseburger and a Bell Lager, the preferred beverage of famous international correspondents.)

I didn't go to Uganda as a tourist, but as a professional journalist. My services had been contracted and half the fee had already been received. Getting the other half is contingent on the publisher getting 70,000 words by May 1. That should be no sweat, honestly, though when worried friends would warn me about the dangers of my intinerary, including a planned visit to Sudan, I'd play it off with a joke: "I'm not worried about the Sudan. It's the deadline that I'm worried about."

People don't always get my jokes, which is why I nearly didn't get out of Heathrow International in London ("random search," my foot!) and why Her Majesty's government provided security all the way to Dulles International, where I eluded their cordon to reach American soil, thus regaining my rights as a U.S. citizen including, thank God, my Fifth Amendment right to remain silent.

As bizarre as that may sound, the reality was even weirder. Perhaps an old Cockney joke summarizes it best:

Q. What's the difference between crazy and eccentric?
A. 'Bout 'alf a million a year, I'd say.

I'll try to update later to explain. For now, I'm just trying to decompress and recover my emotional equilibrium.

Thursday night, Feb. 21, I was present as veterans of the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) held a send-off party for Sam in Kampala, prior to his return to the States. It was a warriors-only tribal celebration, and the two Dinka tribesmen present for the party asked Sam (whose father was half-Cherokee) to share his own tribal customs.

So next thing you know, I'm the civilian eyewitness as Sam is war-whooping and doing a Cherokee dance, while the Dinka are doing their thing, the Acholi are doing theirs ... it was a stone-cold gonzo moment.

If you want to learn more about Sam's work -- among other things, his ministry runs the largest orphanage in Sudan -- check out his Shekinah Fellowship World Missions site. If you want to help with Sam's work, I promise you'll be blessed if you write a check (even if it's only $10 or $20) payable to "World Missions" and mail it to:

World Missions
P.O. Box 131
Central City, PA 15926

Today, if I understand correctly, Sam is out in Los Angeles. He's about to be hugely famous. Like I told Sam at breakfast one day last week, "Dude, you're going to be an action figure by Christmas." That may sound like a joke. It's not. I can easily picture the boys and girls telling Santa to bring them a Sam Childers action figure (complete with a classic '47 Harley) for Christmas.

Trust me. In college, I majored in drama (shout-out to my Alpha Psi Omega brothers and sisters at JSU!) and when it comes to method acting, Sam could give Lee Strasberg some lessons, because Sam never has to ask himself, "What's my motivation?" He's 100% about the job, he's always focused on completing the mission, and he has a low tolerance for distractions.

UPDATE TUESDAY 6:20 AM:

I see my good friend Jimmie at The Sundries Shack has linked -- thanks Jimmie.

I got 7 hours sleep yesterday, which is the longest stretch of sleep I've had in weeks. Looking back over the past several weeks, I realize I have been running at full-throttle overdrive since at least mid-January. The valves were starting to rattle a bit, frankly.

Anyway, after sleeping from 3 until 10 p.m. yesterday, I got up and checked e-mail and Facebook for a while. Then at 2:30 p.m., I hopped in my car (the black KIA Optima I call my "Korean Jag" because its lines look vaguely like a Jaguar) and ran to Wal-Mart with a shopping list of supplies I'll need to organize this book project.

With the copious notes and recordings I got during the Uganda trip -- plus the first drafts of four or five chapters, totalling about 20,000 words, and piles of printed notes by Sam -- we should easily hit this deadline on time and under budget.

Seven hours sleep and a bit of time to unwind have restored my confidence. I have an appointment today at 9:45 a.m. with Dr. Cantone, who said he wanted to see me when I got back to find out if I had any problems with the medications he prescribe me for the Africa trip.

Short answer: Hell, yes.

I was taking the anti-malaria medicine once a day as prescribed, as well as the antibiotic (since I had a respiratory infection) and the pain pill (because the cough was painful). When I got off the plane at Entebbe, I felt stressed-out from a nicotine fit, but as Sam later said, he thought I must be on some serious drugs

The situation became weird beyond words on the return flight to London's Heathrow Airport, where we missed our connecting flight and were laid over until the next day. To say that the Brits are security-conscious about their aviation is to engage in a classic English understatement. But I'll say no more about that, except to say that when I finally made it through customs at Dulles and headed for the exit, I felt like what Jethro Bodine would call a "double-naught spy," having made a narrow escape.

(MUSIC CUE: Johnny Rivers, "Secret Agent Man")

Shaken, not stirred

Not only was my wife waiting for me at the international arrivals gate at Dulles, but she had with her our pastor, Vladimir Corea. Hugs were exchanged, and we headed to the pastor's car.

My checked baggage hadn't made it to Dulles with me (just a coincidence, I'm sure), but Sam had warned me about that possibility, so everything essential was packed into the large nylon flight bag I'd purchased in the duty-free shop at Entebbe. (Yeah, I kept the receipt.)

We rolled out of the airport, with my wife in back and me riding shotgun. I mentioned what Sam had said about the potential hallucinogenic side effects of the anti-malaria medication. Pastor Corea said, "Oh, yeah, that happens all the time. We've had missionaries completely trip out on that stuff. It can be bad, man."

Right. It was as if I'd been through what Tom Wolfe once called "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test." And I'd passed the test.

So the storm was over and now I looked forward, like my buddy Scott said, to "Fair wind and God speed." But I'll keep praying.

'Fair wind and God speed'

My old friend Scotty, a master chief petty officer in the U.S. Navy, just wished me 'Fair wind and God speed,' as I prepare to depart today for The Very Dangerous Foreign Country.

There is a reason I have seldom been specific on the blog about The Very Dangerous Foreign Country. My host, missionary Pastor Sam Childers, has been targeted for death by Joseph Kony, the murderous madman who leads the terrorist cult known as the Lord's Resistance Army. (Here's a "Dateline NBC" story from 2006 about Sam's efforts to save children from Kony and the LRA guerrillas.)

Sam runs an orphanage in Nimule, Sudan:

Over 800 children have been rescued through the work and dedication of Sam Childers and his team. Upon completion of the rescues, great effort is made to reunite the children with surviving family members. If that is not possible, they join the growing family at the Children’s Village.

A screenplay based on Sam's amazing life and work is already on the desk of a major Hollywood film producer. The manuscript of his autobiography is supposed to be completed and delivered to the publisher by May 1. My assignment as a researcher and editor is to make sure Sam meets that deadline.

The situation in Uganda and Sudan is currently unstable. Peace talks with the LRA have been extended until Feb. 28, but Kony's killers are accused of new atrocities:

Officials at the Uganda peace talks in southern Sudan are investigating a report that Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels killed dozens of people in recent attacks in the region, the Ugandan military said on Sunday.
Uganda's army spokesman, Captain Paddy Ankunda, said a senior official from south Sudan's Western Equatorial state, Joseph Ngere, complained to Uganda's government about the raids.
"The deputy governor has protested to Uganda that the LRA has killed dozens of people in his province," Ankunda said.
"We had earlier got the same information that the LRA has killed people. The Cessation of Hostilities team is investigating these claims and if true, that will be a
violation of the truce agreement," he told Reuters in Kampala. ...
A week ago, local government officials and a church group in southern Sudan said suspected LRA fighters had killed at least four people and abducted another 13 in a January 29 attack on Nyepo village, some 120 km (75 miles) from Juba.
A joint report following a visit to the area by the Danish Refugee Council, local government and the church group quoted survivors of the attack as saying it was carried out between 300 to 500 armed men and women carrying rifles and machine guns.

Frankly, I would have preferred to begin my career as a globetrotting foreign correspondent in the French Riviera or Monaco, but nobody's offered to pay me to go anyplace like that, and as I tried to explain to Rod Dreher a couple of years ago, I write for money.

Expect updates ....