The ICC arrest warrants for the Lord's Resistance Army leaders and peace prospects for Northern Uganda

Journal of International Criminal Justice

Volumn 4, Issue 1, 2006, Pages 179-187

  Apuuli, Kasaija Phillip ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 33644996421     PISSN: 14781387     EISSN: 14781395     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/jicj/mqi092     Document Type: Article

References (47)

1. Pre-Trial Chamber II is constituted by Judge Tuiloma Neroni Slade (Presiding Judge), Judge Mauro Politi and Judge Fatoumata Dembele Diarra.
2. Ongwen was killed by the Ugandan army in Amuria, Soroti district on 30 September 2005, days before the warrant against him was unsealed, The New Vision, 6 October 2005, at 1-2.
3. ICC, 'Warrants of Arrest unsealed against Five LRA Commanders', The Hague, 14 October 2005, available online at http://www.icc-cpi.int/press/ pressreleases/114.html (visited 15 October 2005).
4. Ibid.
5. ICC, 'President of Uganda refers situation concerning the Lord's Resistance Army to the ICC' (Press Release), 29 January 2004, available online at http://allafrica.com/stories/printable/200402050214.html (visited 5 Pebruary 2004).
6. As per Arts 13(a) and 14(1) ICCSt.
7. International Crisis Group (ICG), Northern Uganda: Understanding and Solving the Conflict: ICG Africa Report No. 77 (Nairobi/Brussels, 14 April 2004).
8. Ibid.
9. H. Berhend 'IS Alice Lakwena a Witch? The Holy Spirit Movement and its Fight against Evil in the North', in H.B. Hansen and M. Twaddle, Changing Uganda: The Dilemmas of Structural AdJustment and Revolutionary Change (London: James Currey. 1991), at 165.
10. For example, it is reported that these forces massacred 40 civilians in former Head of State Tito Okello's village of Namokora, Kitgum district. Many Acholi and others believe that the NRA chose not to use its disciplined forces in the North, sending instead the most brutal and unruly elements of the 35th battalion, in a deliberate strategy of revenge and subjugation; see ICG, supra note 7, at 3.
11. United Nations Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), 'Uganda: The 18 Year Old that Refuses to Go Away', 28 January 2004, available online at http://allafrica.com/stories/printable/200401280410.html (visited 5 February 2004).
12. R. Doom and K. Vlassenroot, 'Kony's Message: A New Koine? The Lord's Resistance Army in Northern Uganda', 98 African Affairs (1999), at 22.
13. The protocol authorizing the operation has been renewed periodically.
14. The Sunday Monitor, 27 April 2003, at 8.
15. Human Rights Watch (HRW), Abducted and Abused: Renewed Conflict in Northern Uganda, Report Vol. 15, No. 12 (A), July 2003, available online at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/uganda0703 (visited 5 February 2004).
16. Ibid.
17. According to reports, over 85% of the LRA forces are made up of children. As part of initiation into the rebel movement, abducted children are forced into committing inhuman acts, including ritual killing and mutilations. In order to evade capture, thousands of children have become 'night dwellers', walking large numbers of kilometres to regroup in centres run by non-governmental organizations, on the streets, on shop verandas, on church grounds, and in local factories, heading back to their villages at dawn.
18. HRW, 'ICC: Investigate All Sides in Uganda', Press Release, 4 February 2004.
19. The government extended the ceasefire up to 22 February 2005, to give the rebels a chance to assemble in the ceasefire area and wait for the rebel leaders and the government team to sign the Peace Talks Memorandum, The New Vision, 19 February 2005.
20. At that time, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) rebellion was raging in the districts of Kasese, Bundibugyo and Kabarole in western Uganda.
21. Section 3.
22. Refugee Law Project (RLP), Behind the Violence: Causes, Consequences and the Search for Solutions to the War in Northern Uganda (Working Paper No. 11, February 2004), at 7. The AC is a body established to oversee the implementation of the Act.
23. The Daily Monitor, 3 August 2005, at 7.
24. United Nations Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), 'Uganda: Peace Groups and Government Officials Worried about the ICC Probe into the LRA', 30 January 2004, available online at http://allafrica.com/ stories/printable/200401300047.html (visited 5 February 2004).
25. Uganda Anti-Terrorism Act 2001, sch. 1. Under this law, the LRA and another rebel group called the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) were declared terrorist organizations.
26. The East African, 16 February 2004.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
29. The Daily Monitor, 10 October 2005, at 3.
30. United Nations Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN), 16 March 2005.
31. The group includes: Archbishop John Baptist Odama, Bishop McLeod Baker Ochola, Bishop Nelson Onono Onweng, MPs Jane Akwero Odwong and Jacob Oulanyah, the LCV Chairman of Gulu district Colonel Walter Ochora, and the Acholi Paramount Chief Rwot David Onen Acana.
32. The Daily Monitor, 29 March 2005.
33. The Minister of State in charge of Northern Uganda, Grace Akello, is reported to have said that efforts by the Acholi (groups) to appeal to the ICC to refrain from issuing arrest warrants against LRA leaders were contrary to the government position; see The Daily Monitor, 19 March 2005.
34. The East African, 17-23 October 2005, at 11.
35. Ibid.
36. The Sunday Monitor, 9 October 2005, at 2.
37. Statement by Chief Prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo, 14 October 2005, available online at http://www.icc-cpi.int/library/organs/otp/Uganda-LMO Speech 14102005.pdf (visited 27 October 2005).
38. Supra note 34.
39. Ibid.
40. HRW, Uprooted and Forgotten: Impunity and Human Rights Abuses in Northern Uganda, Vol. 17, No. 12(A), September 2005, available online at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2005/uganda0905/index.htm (visited 27 October 2005).
41. See also K.P. Apuuli, 'The International Criminal Court (ICC) and the Lords Resistance Army (LRA) Insurgency in Northern Uganda', 15 Criminal Law Forum (2004), 391-409 (detailing the crimes within the jurisdiction of the ICC that the Court might charge with the UPDF).
42. Supra note 37.
43. A.M. Danner, 'Prosecutorial Discretion and Legitimacy', 97 American Journal of International Law (2003), at 537 (internal quotation marks omitted).
44. Ibid.
45. The New Vision, 3 October 2005, at 1.
46. Ibid.
47. The Daily Monitor, 8 October 2005, at 1.