Uganda offers "blood settlement" to LRA rebels
By Adrian Croft
LONDON, March 11 (Reuters) - A Ugandan peace deal will allow rebels to atone for crimes through a traditional "blood settlement", avoiding prison and judgment by an international court, President Yoweri Museveni said on Tuesday.
Representatives of Uganda's rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and government officials are close to a final deal to end one of Africa's longest-running conflicts that has killed tens of thousands and uprooted 2 million more.
The rebels insist any accord depends on the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague first scrapping war crimes indictments against LRA leader Joseph Kony and two other rebel commanders.
The government has said it will only ask the ICC to scrap the indictments after a peace deal has been signed.
That would pose a serious dilemma for the fledgling ICC, set up in 2002 as the world's first permanent war crime court, which could be accused of bowing to politics if it drops the charges or of wrecking peace talks if it does not.
Museveni, on a visit to London, told reporters the only reason Uganda had asked the ICC to intervene was because the LRA leaders were in the Democratic Republic of Congo, outside Uganda's control.
If the rebels returned to Uganda, "what we have said in the agreement is that instead of using this formal Western type of justice we are going to use the traditional justice, a traditional blood settlement mechanism," he said.
Under this system, someone who has "committed a mistake" asks for forgiveness and pays some compensation, he said. "That settles their accountability."
"In that case, we can approach the ICC and say, yes, those people who we have brought to your attention have now come (back) ... Therefore we ask you to withdraw our complaint."
If they opted for the traditional settlement, Kony and the other LRA leaders would avoid prison, he said.
Led by former altar boy and self-proclaimed mystic Kony, who believes he is possessed by the Holy Spirit, the LRA spread terror in north Uganda and southern Sudan, often targeting civilians and mutilating survivors by slicing off lips and ears.
Thousands of children were kidnapped and forcibly recruited.
Museveni, who referred the conflict in Uganda to the ICC in 2003, acknowledged that some people who have suffered at the hands of the LRA would "not be happy" with an agreement under which the LRA leaders did not go to prison.
Lawyers for the Ugandan rebels met ICC officials on Monday to push the court to drop charges against Kony.
The ICC said officials could only discuss procedural issues, not the merits of cases before the court.
A mediator said last week that Kony would emerge from hiding this month to sign a final peace agreement.
Musevini, current chairman of the 53-nation Commonwealth, said he would wait and see if Kony did come out into the open.
Analysts say Kony, believed to be hiding in remote eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, is key to any lasting agreement. No outsiders have seen him for months. (Editing by Matthew Jones)
LONDON, March 11 (Reuters) - A Ugandan peace deal will allow rebels to atone for crimes through a traditional "blood settlement", avoiding prison and judgment by an international court, President Yoweri Museveni said on Tuesday.
Representatives of Uganda's rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) and government officials are close to a final deal to end one of Africa's longest-running conflicts that has killed tens of thousands and uprooted 2 million more.
The rebels insist any accord depends on the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague first scrapping war crimes indictments against LRA leader Joseph Kony and two other rebel commanders.
The government has said it will only ask the ICC to scrap the indictments after a peace deal has been signed.
That would pose a serious dilemma for the fledgling ICC, set up in 2002 as the world's first permanent war crime court, which could be accused of bowing to politics if it drops the charges or of wrecking peace talks if it does not.
Museveni, on a visit to London, told reporters the only reason Uganda had asked the ICC to intervene was because the LRA leaders were in the Democratic Republic of Congo, outside Uganda's control.
If the rebels returned to Uganda, "what we have said in the agreement is that instead of using this formal Western type of justice we are going to use the traditional justice, a traditional blood settlement mechanism," he said.
Under this system, someone who has "committed a mistake" asks for forgiveness and pays some compensation, he said. "That settles their accountability."
"In that case, we can approach the ICC and say, yes, those people who we have brought to your attention have now come (back) ... Therefore we ask you to withdraw our complaint."
If they opted for the traditional settlement, Kony and the other LRA leaders would avoid prison, he said.
Led by former altar boy and self-proclaimed mystic Kony, who believes he is possessed by the Holy Spirit, the LRA spread terror in north Uganda and southern Sudan, often targeting civilians and mutilating survivors by slicing off lips and ears.
Thousands of children were kidnapped and forcibly recruited.
Museveni, who referred the conflict in Uganda to the ICC in 2003, acknowledged that some people who have suffered at the hands of the LRA would "not be happy" with an agreement under which the LRA leaders did not go to prison.
Lawyers for the Ugandan rebels met ICC officials on Monday to push the court to drop charges against Kony.
The ICC said officials could only discuss procedural issues, not the merits of cases before the court.
A mediator said last week that Kony would emerge from hiding this month to sign a final peace agreement.
Musevini, current chairman of the 53-nation Commonwealth, said he would wait and see if Kony did come out into the open.
Analysts say Kony, believed to be hiding in remote eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, is key to any lasting agreement. No outsiders have seen him for months. (Editing by Matthew Jones)
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