200811272305 | Uganda urges Kony to sign deal

Uganda urges Kony to sign deal

Kampala - The Ugandan government on Friday urged elusive rebel leader Joseph Kony to sign an overdue peace agreement but voiced doubts the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) chief would show up for the weekend signing.

A deadline set by the government for Kony to sign a peace deal ending a two-decade-old civil war in northern Uganda was to expire on Saturday but the rebel leader has so far failed to attend several meetings.

"I have no assurances at all that Kony will be there," Ruhakana Rugunda, the head of the government delegation that has already inked the internationally-backed peace deal, said.

"But I will tell you what I want. The peace agreement should have been signed months ago. So Kony is late, and he should use this opportunity to sign," warned Rugunda, also Uganda's interior minister.

Should Kony show up, a ceremony has been planned for Saturday in Ri-Kwangba, a jungle town in soutthern Sudan.

Betty Ocan Aol, a lawmaker from Gulu, one of Uganda's northern districts most affected by the conflict, said the region badly needed Kony to sign the agreement.

"We need this final agreement signed. We need it so, so much," Aol said. "And if Joseph Kony doesn't show up tomorrow that means (he) is really fooling our people and wasting our time."

She added that "the government will almost certainly say that if the LRA aren't involved then what is the point of proceeding with peace and reconciliation.

"But I would argue that you can and should proceed with peace and reconciliation without LRA involvement."

Peace talks sponsored by Sudan and the United Nations halted in April when Kony refused to sign a peace accord, because of arrest warrants against him and his lieutenants from the International Criminal Court over war crimes.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed and nearly two million displaced in the two decades of fighting between the LRA and the government.