THANK YOU UNITED NATIONS
The United Nations (UN) Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, Jan Egeland, strongly criticised the complacency of the international community towards the situation in North Uganda yesterday, describing it as "a moral outrage". That is not to say that people aren't to blame, starting with Joseph Kony, leader of the self-styled LRA (lord's Resistance Army), which has mounted an absurd offensive against the Kampala government since the late 1980s. However, Uganadan President Yoweri Museveni is not without his share of the blame either, for failing to protect civilians from the LRA raids. On what grounds did this gentleman send his troops into neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo in August 1998? To defend the integrity of the Ugandan nation or to exploit his neighbour's vast mineral resources? Kampala's dubious activities in northeast Congo and the atrocities perpetrated by foreign armies - including the Ugandan army - in general have been denounced in various UN reports. So how come Museveni has not managed to put an end to an elusive guerrilla force made up of wild adolescents? The truth is that for too long now Museveni has tolerated the LRA with the aim of checking the Acholi people, who traditionally oppose his political leadership. And now that the army, formerly deployed in ex-Zaire, has returned home, the rebels continue their incursions in the absence of the political will to stop them. But this is not all. The civil war in North Uganda is typical of the many wars that have been 'forgotten' by the international media in particular, which is preoccuppied with sending legions of journalists to Iraq, where the weapons of mass destruction have never been found. And if on the one hand Baghdad and the surrounding area have become a media circus deafened by the roar of battle, which continues in the name of the 'god' oil, on the other conflicts are raging in many other forgotten corners of the world, where the geopolitical interests are the same, even if no-one is bold enough to say so. Yes, because the war waged by LRA in North Uganda is also linked to the oil buisiness in neighbouring Sudan, considering that Museveni has backed John Garang's SPLA (Sudan People's Liberation Army) for years, while Khartoum has given its blessing to Kony's anti-Ugandan 'holy war'. For us at MISNA, the stand made by the UN represents a minor victory given that we have been one of only a few people to have followed this forgotten war on a daily basis. If one day a television studio should give space to these 'second-rate' conflicts, our people too would understand that it is worth taking action to give a voice to the voiceless. One thing is certain: Egeland's definition of the Great Lakes region as "the most serious humanitarian crisis of our time" appeals to general common sense, with politicians in the lead. (Translation of an editorial article by Father Giulio Albanese)
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And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, 'When will you be satisfied?' We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities (.) No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream". (Martin Luther King, 1964 Nobel Peace prize laureate, assassinated for his struggle)
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