January 16, 2009
By Matthew Davies

Several parishes and villages in Sudan's Episcopal Diocese of Mundri have fallen victim to a fresh wave of attacks by the Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan rebel organization whose soldiers are prolonging a two-decades-long terrorist campaign gruesomely marked by widespread massacres and child abductions.

At least four people have been confirmed dead and insecurity in the region is forcing residents to flee the villages of Tore Wandi, Moba, Bangolo, Ledinwa and Garia for the relative safety of Mundri.

One of the slain is Wilson, a lay reader at a parish in Moba, wrote the Rt. Rev. Bismark Monday, bishop of Mundri, in a January 15 email to church partners. Monday explained that one of Wilson's sons and grandsons – both about 10 years old – were abducted.

"Wilson decided to follow the LRA with another young [man] in the hope of securing the release of these boys," Monday wrote. After walking for more than 20 miles under arrest with the LRA, "Wilson and the young man were both tied," added Monday. "Their hands and legs were chopped off while still alive." The two men were reportedly beaten and killed in front of the boys, who were left along the roadside.

The boys were found and taken to Mundri, Monday reported. "We had the boys in our house yesterday for consolation. Both are traumatized, like many others, and we could not believe our ears as they shared the stories with us."

Monday said that a daughter of the Rev. Sylvester Yona, an Episcopal priest in the Mundri diocese, has reportedly been abducted by LRA soldiers who also took 11 people in Tore Wandi.

"For weeks we have been watching the insecurity mount in the region," said Janette O'Neill, Episcopal Relief and Development's director for Africa programs. "Bishops in western equatoria have reported increasing numbers of people on the move desperate to save their lives and protect their children."

These recent reports indicate that "Operation Lighting Thunder," a joint military offensive initiated on December 14, 2008 by the governments of Uganda, Southern Sudan and DR Congo against the LRA, has not forced the rebels to cease their brutal attacks and sign a much-anticipated peace deal.

The Ugandan government has been engaged in negotiations with the LRA since August 2006 when a landmark truce was signed following peace talks in the south Sudanese capital, Juba. The government and the rebels signed a ceasefire in January 2008 that stopped short of an all-out peace agreement. LRA rebel leader Joseph Kony has been indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The conflict in Northern Uganda began soon after the then-National Resistance Army (NRA) of former President Museveni took power in 1986. Remnants of the previous government's forces fled into northern Uganda and southern Sudan and formed the Ugandan People's Democratic Army (UPDA). Several splinter groups emerged out of the UPDA before the LRA was formed.

The LRA's grim trademark has been the abduction and forced conscription of children, who have been turned into soldiers and sex slaves.

"As Episcopalians in the United States continue to pray for the people of Mundri, we are also keenly aware of the need to re-focus the attention of the world's leaders on the grave threat to all people in central Africa posed by the so-called Lord's Resistance Army," said Alexander Baumgarten, international policy analyst for the Episcopal Church's Office of Government Relations. "As the tragic situation in Mundri again demonstrates, no country in this region is safe as long as the LRA exists unchecked."

U.S.-based Episcopalians can help "by telling their lawmakers to support all steps necessary to apprehend and bring to justice the leaders of the LRA and to protect civilian populations in the region from the violence," Baumgarten added. He said that urgent action should include the deployment of U.N. and other international peacekeeping forces, the development of a viable international strategy to arrest LRA leaders, and continued support for a negotiated settlement to one of the world's longest-running and bloodiest conflicts.

After learning about the recent displacement and people trekking miles to reach Mundri, Monday said the diocese arranged for a truck to drive about 37 miles to Ledingwa to carry some of the women, children and elderly people who were struggling to make the journey. After about 30 miles the driver arrived in Garia, which was under LRA attack, and was forced to return to Mundri picking up women and children along the way.

As the diocese reaches out to the displaced, some of whom are living in the cathedral compound, Monday said that many locals are also faced with the challenges of harvesting. "The people have left their crops [and] grain in the fields," he said. "The LRA has burnt most of the homes in those places including the [surrounding] bush/grass. Moreover, whatever basic utensils people had have been taken."

O'Neill noted that just after Christmas in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the LRA entered a catholic church and massacred four hundred people. "The terrifying attack in Mundri was joined this morning by news of another atrocity in the Diocese of Ezo," she said. "People are simply terrified – abandoning their crops in the field and their homes and few possessions."

Despite being roiled by conflict, Monday said that people throughout the diocese are "nevertheless praying and asking you to pray with us ... Those of us in Mundri are generally [living] in fear, though we are still trusting God to rescue the situation."

Baumgarten commended the attention of U.S. Episcopalians to the work of two partner organizations in Washington that specialize in equipping Americans to advocate for an end to the conflict generated by the LRA: Resolve Uganda and the Enough! Project.

Said O'Neill: "We need to act to shine whatever light can be brought into this dark, dark situation. We must pray for peace, advocate for peace, demand that politicians in the region pursue a settlement with the LRA. We must mobilize resources to ensure that the lack of food and shelter can be met and the basic humanitarian needs are provided."

Episcopal News Service
Matthew Davies is editor of Episcopal Life Online and international correspondent for the Episcopal News Service.