Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army rebel chief to be tried at international court

Captured Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army rebel chief Dominic Ongwen will be sent to the International Criminal Court to face charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity, Uganda’s military said Tuesday. Ongwen is in the custody of U.S. special forces after surrendering in the Central African Republic last week. A former child soldier himself, Ongwen was a senior aide to LRA leader and warlord Joseph Kony. He is accused of directing bloody campaigns in northern Uganda in the early 2000s where thousands were killed or abducted to be used as child soldiers or sex slaves, as well as carrying out attacks on civilians in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

I am now a free man despite the ICC case against me. If I can come back, then what about you who have no case?

Dominic Ongwen in an audio recording originally broadcast on local radio in Central African Republic

Uganda has pardoned around 13,000 former LRA rebels under a 2000 amnesty law, though it is unclear if Ongwen would qualify for it. The LRA rose up against the government in northern Uganda in the late 1980s under Kony’s leadership, who claimed to be guided by the voices of spirits. Having earned a reputation for carrying out massacres and mutilating victims, the LRA left Uganda about a decade ago and has roamed across parts of Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and CAR since then, eluding efforts to defeat them.

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