Negotiator quits as Uganda rebel talks falter

By Francis Kwera and Skye Wheeler

RI-KWANGBA, Sudan (Reuters) - The top negotiator for Uganda's fugitive rebel leader Joseph Kony said he had quit on Thursday after a delay signing a final peace deal, but sources involved in the talks said he had been fired.

"I said earlier that if Kony does not appear to sign this peace agreement, I will not associate myself with him anymore," David Nyekorach-Matsanga told Reuters on the remote Sudan-Congo border. "Today, I did not see Kony and he did not appear to sign the peace agreement."

Sources involved in the talks said Kony had apparently refused to meet the negotiator after asking mediators to clarify parts of the document he had negotiated on his behalf.

Kony, who is wanted for multiple war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC), did not show his face at a planned signing ceremony at the frontier hamlet of Ri-Kwangba on Thursday, and appeared to have left the area again when elders went to meet him.

South Sudan's Vice President Riek Machar said the LRA leader was unsure how the Ugandan government planned to use its courts and traditional reconciliation rituals to counter the ICC arrest warrants.

Kampala's chief negotiator had earlier said Kony's request was "absolutely legitimate" and that his team was happy to be patient.

Matsanga was closely guarded by south Sudanese soldiers after he returned to camp alone while his team stayed with the rebels in the bush. The sources said the negotiator, a member of the Ugandan diaspora who was once an LRA spokesman in London, would leave in the morning.

WORLD COURT

Kony's 22-year rebellion killed tens of thousands of people, uprooted 2 million more in northern Uganda and destabilized neighboring parts of southern Sudan and eastern Congo.

ICC prosecutors in The Hague accuse the LRA commander and two top deputies of offences including rape, murder and the abduction of thousands of children to serve as fighters, porters and sex slaves.

Even if Kony does sign a final peace deal, the rebels have vowed never to disarm until the indictments are scrapped.

Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni is due to sign the agreement at a separate ceremony on April 15 in Juba.

His government has said it will only call for the ICC warrants to be lifted after a final deal is reached. It was not clear whether that meant the rebels have to disarm first too.

The ICC has said its warrants for Kony and the two other commanders -- Okot Odhiambo and Dominic Ongwen -- remain active. But the U.N. Security Council could ask the court to put them on hold if members see a real chance for peace.

In a bid to convince the ICC the matter can be handled internally, Kampala and the rebels have agreed to set up a special division of Uganda's High Court to deal with war crimes.

The government also plans to employ the north's ancient "Mato oput" ritual, in which parties confess their crimes publicly and ask for forgiveness.

ICC supporters say that only a judicial process delivering stiff jail terms for grave crimes is an acceptable alternative.

But the court does not want to be seen as the last barrier to peace if talks look like ending one of the continent's most brutal and intractable conflicts.

(Writing by Daniel Wallis)

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