Suchergebnisse

Since the late 1980s, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a spiritualist rebel group with no clear political agenda, has abducted tens of thousands of children and adults to serve as porters and soldiers. Experience of forced conscription into the LRA is traumatic and varies in scope and intensity. Children and youth – some as young as 7 and 8 years old – have been forced to mutilate and kill civilians, including members of their own families and communities. In 1994, a group of parents of abducted children to establish the Gulu Support the Children Organization (GUSCO), a reception center in Gulu that provides medical care, counseling, and a number of other services. More than 20,000 children and youth have since passed through GUSCO and other reception centers throughout northern Uganda. In December 2005, the Berkeley-Tulane Initiative on Vulnerable Populations launched The Database Project to better document abduction and help improve the capacity of 8 reception centers in the northern districts of Gulu, Kitgum, Pader, Apac, and Lira to collect and analyze information about former LRA abductees. At the time, these centers were still providing housing and care to hundreds of children and youth. This report presents the findings of the project, which analyzes the overall incidence of abduction based on those data and provides recommendations aimed at improving the process of reintegrating former LRA abductees into their communities.

Emergence of the conflict in Northern Uganda -- Mystification of the conflict in Northern Uganda -- Regionalization of the lRA insurgency -- Internationalization of the conflict in Northern Uganda -- De-escalation of the lRA insurgency -- Modus operandi of lRA I -- Modus operandi of lRA II -- Longevity and termination of the lRA insurgency -- Conclusion

Part 1. Interpretations of Uganda's war in the north: Exploring the roots of LRA violence: political crisis and ethnic politics in Acholiland / Adam Branch ; Uganda's politics of foreign aid and violent conflict: the political uses of the LRA rebellion / Andrew Mwenda ; The spiritual order of the LRA / Kristof Titeca ; An African hell of colonial imagination? The Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda, another story / Sverker Finnstrom -- Part 2. Experiencing the LRA: Chasing the Kony story / Mareike Schomerus ; 'A terrorist is not a person like me': an interview with Joseph Kony / Mareike Schomerus ; On the nature and causes of LRA abduction: what the abductees say / Christopher Blattman and Jeannie Annan ; Between two worlds: former LRA soldiers in northern Uganda / Ben Mergelsberg ; Encountering Kony: a Madi perspective / Ronald Iya -- Part 3. Peace and justice: Northern Uganda: a 'forgotten conflict', again? The impact of the internationalization of the resolution process / Sandrine Perrot ; 'The realists in Juba'? An analysis of the Juba peace talks / Ronald R. Atkinson ; NGO involvement in the Juba peace talks; the role and dilemmas of IKV Pax Christi / Simon Simonse, Willemijn Verkoren and Gerd Junne ; Bitter roots: the 'invention' of Acholi traditional justice / Tim Allen ; The ICC investigation of the Lord's Resistance Army: an insider's view / Matthew Brubacher -- Postscript: a kind of peace and an exported war / Tim Allen, Frederick Laker, Holly Porter and Mareike Schomerus.

During the period 1986 through the mid-2000s,var ious rebel movements arose in Acholiland in northern Uganda to struggle against the National Resistance government of Yoweri Museveni who himself had come to power in January 1986 after overthrowing the regime of Tito Okello Lutwa. Of these rebel movements, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) led by Joseph Kony was the most notorious and its activities plunged northern Uganda into a civil war with devastating consequences. Whereas it began as a struggle for political inclusion of the Acholi, the LRA carried out massacres, lootings, mutilations and abductions against the very people that it claimed to fight for.

Abstract
Dominant storylines about armed conflicts and rebel groups, such as the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebel group in Uganda, typically focus on violence, suffering, harm, and abuse. Without a doubt, life within insurgency groups, including in the LRA, is characterized by immense social suffering, typically portrayed to be beyond the pale of humanity. Yet, what of the connections of compassion, joy, love, and care that emerged in the context of cohesion and alongside these aspects and experiences of violence, suffering, and abuse? Over the years, our interlocutors narrated to us what can be understood as meaningful forms of kinship, social connections, or intimacy during and after their time with the group; in the context of conjugal spousal relations, among fellow recruits, or between abductees and their families and communities. This article focuses on these practices of love and care within and in the wake of life in the LRA, and how they are entangled with and sit alongside experiences of violence. The simultaneities of care and suffering constitute a key aspect of this analysis; not intending to negate, downplay, ignore, or trivialize the detrimental impact of violence within rebel groups in general, nor to idealize the relations of compassion, love, or care that emerged within this context. This dual focus, we maintain, is important for unearthing the complexities, intricacies, and nuances of peoples' lived realities in the context of insurgency movements, and in the context of armed conflict more broadly, holding important analytical and ethical implications.

Describes the experiences of children kidnapped into service for the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda, in which boys are required to complete brutal initiations--murdering their parents, friends, and relatives--and girls are forced into sexual slavery and labor