76 US Lawmakers Urge Obama to Continue Kony Hunt admin Col Michael Kabango welcomes LRA commander Lt Col Sam Opio who surrendered to UPDF in CAR 76 members of the US House of Representatives have signed on to the letter to US President Barack Obama seeking his continued support for the US efforts aimed at ending the violence perpetrated by the Joseph Kony led Lord’s Resistance Army. The letter was sent to President Obama on August 1, 2014, just days to the first-ever U.S.-Africa Summit where nearly 50 heads of state from the continent discussed critical issues between the U.S. and the African continent, including security. Last year, a House letter on the same issue received 75 signatures. “We are writing to express our continued support for robust U.S. efforts aimed at ending the violence perpetrated by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in central Africa,” Ed Royce (R-CA), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA). The lawmakers said through U.S. support, the regional counter-LRA mission has made significant progress in denting this deadly force. “The LRA has lost as much as one-fifth of its core fighting capacity and are losing valuable captives that provide much of the day to day labour for the rebel group. However, we remain concerned that LRA leader Joseph Kony and his senior combatants continue to pose a significant threat to the African Great Lakes Region and retain their capacity to terrorize innocent civilian populations by exploiting broader regional instability.” Chairman Royce and Rep. McGovern are the authors of 2010 legislation that required the Obama Administration to develop a strategy to confront the LRA. In the letter to the President, the members added: “We urge you to maintain U.S. efforts to end the LRA threat and ensure they are part of a broader strategy focused on promoting security across the region. Kony’s method of filling LRA ranks through the mass abduction of children and youth underscores the risk that the group will regenerate if the U.S. and regional governments initiate a premature draw down of counter-LRA operations.” Every six months, President Obama and a team of his high-level advisors review the advisor mission on counter LRA mission in east and central Africa and decide whether to end it, modify it, or to extend it for an additional six months. The President has continued to extend the mission since late 2011. This August, the advisor mission is up for review once again. Last month, Representatives Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Ed Royce (R-CA), who have been long-time champions on the LRA issue, wrote a letter to President Obama encouraging him to recommit the U.S. advisors to this mission and allow them the time they need to accomplish the goals they have been given. The letter was introduced to Congress and was signed by 76 members of the House of Representatives. In the Central African Republic (CAR), the rebel group has targeted civilian areas that have been destabilized by the country’s violent civil war. Reportedly ten of the 13 attacks in which the LRA abducted ten or more people in 2013 occurred in areas in CAR under the control of Seleka rebel fighters. In neighboring Democratic Republic of the Congo, the LRA have allegedly financed their deadly operations by poaching elephants in Garamba National Park and trafficking the wildlife products to Sudan and elsewhere. Indeed, this regional instability seems to have contributed to a recent increase in LRA attacks and abductions since the beginning of this year. In May 2010, Congress passed the bipartisan Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act (P.L. 111-172) and continues to support the strategy outlined in the legislation. This includes the deployment of military advisers and other logistical and intelligence support to assist regional counter-LRA forces, the expansion of programs to protect civilians and promote defections from the LRA, and the provision of humanitarian assistance. Most recently, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014 (P.L. 113-66) reaffirmed that commitment stating in the bill’s report language, “we believe U.S. military advisers should assist their partners with the full-range of activities short of direct combat…we remain fully supportive of this advise and assist operation.” “As the Administration assesses progress in countering the LRA and deliberates on the future of U.S. efforts, we urge you to sustain core elements of the current strategy until Joseph Kony and senior LRA commanders are removed from the battlefield and the LRA no longer poses such a severe threat to civilians,” said the legislators. “In particular, we note the essential role U.S. military advisers deployed in the field play in supporting operations by regional forces, improving information-sharing and civilian early warning networks, and promoting voluntary defections from the LRA.”
Posted on: Thu, 07 Aug 2014 11:39:48 +0000
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