Lord's Resistance Army On The Run

The Lord's Resistance Army continues to reel from concentrated attacks by the joint military forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Uganda, and South Sudan. A group of 20 rebels surrendered to the Congolese army just three days after ten others were killed during a rebel assault on Megero airstrip in the northeastern DRC.

The three armies launched the offensive December 14. Code named, "Operation Lightning Thunder," it has scattered the rebels and sent them fleeing deeper into the jungles of Garamba and into neighboring Central African Republic, where they have raided villages in the past. The LRA is believed to consist of fewer than 1,000 fighters now, the remnants of a force trying to overthrow Uganda's government for over 20 years.

While the combined government operation has achieved notable success, destroying LRA bases with concentrated air and ground attacks, capturing two rebel commanders, James Onen and Peter Okot, and cutting supply lines to the remaining forces, LRA leader Jospeh Kony remains at large.

The rebels have also lashed out at civilians as they flee the government armies. They killed 20 people at a park ranger station in the town of Megero. In two other attacks Sunday, they raided a Protestant mission in Napopo and attacked Laso, a village in South Sudan. Over the Christmas holiday, rebels massacred about 100 civilians in the towns of Faradje and Tadu.

There were reports of brutal atrocities committed by the rebels in those attacks, unconfirmed but not unlike those for which Kony and two of his commanders have been indicted by the International Criminal Court.

If the combined operation can capture Kony or at least neutralize his militia, Joseph Kabila will have taken a major step toward stablizing the eastern provinces.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds a romantic thriller about blood diamonds in the Congo.

New Allies Attack Lord's Resistance Army

While media attention on the Democratic Republic of Congo has been focused on North Kivu and the uprising led by renegade general Laurent Nkunda, military action against another self-proclaimed liberator has been launched in the DRC. Yesterday, the armed forces of Uganda (UPDF), DRC (FARDC) and Southern Sudan (SPLA) launched a joint attack on Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army in the Garamba forests of the DRC.

Kony is one of the worst operators in the region, noted for killing and abusing citizens and particularly for kidnapping children. He is reputed to have dozens of "wives" and to personally select sex slaves for the pleasure of his commanders. His long-running guerrilla war against Uganda is believed to have created two million refugees in the last 22 years. He and several of his underlings are wanted by the International Criminal Court for their crimes against humanity.

In a joint press release reported in Reuters, the three nations' military intelligence chiefs said the armed forces attacked the main body of Kony's army and destroyed its main camp, burning it to the ground.

Kony has proven adept at swift movement and cross-border raids into Sudan, Uganda, and the Central African Republic. He operates from numerous camps in the thick forests of Garamba National park near Congo's northern border with Sudan. His tactics have continually frustrated the UN forces in Congo as well as the FARDC and no quick end is expected for the campaign to bring him to justice.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds a romantic thriller about blood diamonds in the Congo.

DRC Attacks Ugandan Rebels

The Congolese army attacked the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in the northeastern DRC last week, sending several hundred troops to Dungu, which lies close to the border with Sudan. The action, which was intended to protect civilians from the LRA, was supported logistically by the UN mission in the DRC, MONUC.

Military action in the DRC isn't confined to one front or just one set of adversaries. More than 20 official armies, rebel militias, and armed gangs operate in the eastern and northeastern provinces alone. Atrocities are committed and shots are heard from the border with Sudan in the northeast to Angola in the southwest as the epic struggle for control of the Congo's resources continues just as it was described in my novel, Heart of Diamonds.

Civilians are targeted for abuse as the warring factions seize regions they can tax or otherwise extort.

"Our investigations show that there were eight killings, 52 abductions, of which 11 cases involved girls under the age of 18, and nine rapes," said Benoit Kinalebu, a Catholic priest and head of the Dungu branch of the Justice and Peace Commission.

The offenses were reportedly committed between August 2007 and July 2008.

LRA leader Joseph Kony is under indictment by the International Criminal Court for human rights abuses during his ongoing fight with the Ugandan government. Kony has been hiding in the mountainous area on the edge of Garamba national park in the DRC, using it as a base of operations to send raiding parties into Uganda. The LRA leader was meant to have signed a comprehensive peace agreement with the Ugandan government in April 2008, but he failed to show up for the ceremony.

Kony was a no-show in the southern Sudanese jungle town of Ri-Kwangba on September 6, where he was again supposed to sign the agreement already inked by the Ugandan government.

The Ugandan government expressed appreciation for the DRC's action.

"Our view is that the LRA can never engage in any meaningful peace process if they don't have pressure behind them," said Ugandan army spokesman Major Paddy Ankunda.

The spill-over of long-running conflicts within neighboring countries like Uganda, Rwanda, and Sudan continue to undermine efforts to create a peaceful, stable Democratic Republic of Congo.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds

Tags: romantic thriller, Congo, blood diamonds

Olympic Team Gives Hope To Child Soldiers

Lopez Lomong, the Sudanese "lost boy" who led 600 American athletes onto the field during the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, could be Christophe, one of the main characters in Heart of Diamonds, my novel of scandal, love and death in the Congo. Lomong’s story had a happy, triumphal ending; Christophe’s tale is more typical of the thousands of child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo and other nations where boys and girls are kidnapped, drugged, brainwashed, and bullied into becoming killers, rapists, and sex slaves.

In 1991, Lomong fled the Sudan at the age of six after having been separated from his parents by the civil war between the Arab north and Christian south that left two million dead in his still-deeply-troubled native land. He was one of the "lost boys" who trekked on foot for hundreds of miles, many dying of starvation and even lion attacks as they made their way to refugee camps in Kenya. In 2001, he was one of the 4,000 boys resettled in the United States.

Lomong is now an American citizen, a successful middle-distance runner, who was chosen by his teammates to carry the Stars and Stripes in the parade of nations during the opening ceremonies in Beijing. Christophe is a fictional character, but his story is much more typical.

In the opening scene of Heart of Diamonds, Christophe tells how he was captured and forced to watch his mother’s brutal rape, torture, and murder by guerrillas who attacked his village near the Congo’s border with Angola. The fourteen-year-old is forced to kill a fellow villager before being marched away to begin his life as a child soldier. He plays a key role throughout the book, but his story doesn’t end as happily as Lopez Lomong’s.

Heart of Diamonds is a work of fiction, of course, but thousands of children in the Congo have suffered Christophe’s fate. They are captured by militias, guerrillas, and war lords like dissident general Laurent Nkunda, whose National Congress for the Defense of the Congolese (CNDP), was reported to have deployed child soldiers as recently as December, 2007. Bosco Ntaganda, chief of staff of Nkunda’s militia, has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for conscripting children, but Nkunda has refused to turn him over for trial.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds

Tags: romantic thriller, Congo, blood diamonds