afrol News, 30 September - Amama Mbabazi, Uganda's Minister of Defence and Attorney General, visited Washington last week to brief US policymakers on Uganda's progress in the war on terrorism, in particular Uganda's "increasingly successful defence against a longstanding rebellion in northern Uganda," according to the Ugandan Ministry of Defence.

The US government is one of those that has followed Uganda's call to brand the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) a "terrorist group". While the LRA shows no signs of being connected to international terrorist groups, the extremely brutal rebels nevertheless have devastated the Uganda's north through terror, kidnapping, rape, murder, and mutilation. Uganda, therefore, plays a large part in the US-led "war against terror".

In meetings on Capitol Hill, Minister Mbabazi discussed "concerns about the war in northern Uganda and its spillover into neighbouring Sudan," according to a statement released today by Uganda's Ministry of Defence.

Two other topics - the Ministry of Defence's efforts to promote sexual abstinence among members of the armed forces as a means to prevent and control the spread of HIV/AIDS and Uganda's efforts to eradicate human trafficking - were also discussed with the US counterpart.

Minister Mbabazi met with Pentagon officials to discuss Uganda's participation in the so-called "East Africa Counter Terrorism Initiative" as well as possible US basing at Entebbe Airport, part of a "lily pad" approach that the Pentagon calls "cooperative security locations" for the new US global defence posture, which allows for access for US forces in special circumstances and promises to be a focal point for regional cooperation.

Minister Mbabazi noted that in August 1998, on the same day that the US Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by suspected al-Qaeda terrorists, Ugandan authorities squelched a terrorist plot to bomb the US Embassy in Kampala. He said: "We knew about Osama bin Laden before you did."

- Uganda has been a front-line state in the war on terror for more than a decade, the Ugandan government release said. Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni is a close friend of Washington - often termed a "news breed of African leaders" here - and he has been eager to become the principal US ally in Africa.

Four Ugandan nationals, captured in Afghanistan after 9/11, are now in US custody at Cuba's Guantánamo Bay. According to the Kampala government, "they are members of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), which aims to overthrow the legitimate government of Uganda."

Both the LRA and ADF have been designated as terrorist groups by the US Department of State, the Ugandan Ministry emphasised. Minister Mbabazi in the statement further claimed that "Uganda's domestic terrorist groups have been subsidised and trained by al-Qaeda."

Minister Mbabazi reported that the International Criminal Court in The Hague is investigating the LRA and its leader, Joseph Kony, and has indicted Mr Kony on charges of massive violations of human rights. "Now anyone who supports the LRA risks being seen as an accomplice to Kony's crimes in the world court," he said.

By staff writer

© afrol News

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