GULU, Uganda — Not a day passes that Patricia Akello Wamoyi doesn’t relive the violence inflicted on her family and community by Joseph Kony and his militant cult, the Lord's Resistance Army, 13 years ago.
Her husband’s spirit doesn’t let her forget.
“They were child soldiers, people I knew very well,” said Mrs. Wamoyi, 45. “They raped me three times, slaughtered my husband — his vengeful spirit has been haunting me.”
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The 53-year-old Kony hasn’t attracted much attention since a documentary about his war crimes went viral on the Internet in 2012, instantly making him one of the most well-known fugitives in the world. But as the hunt closes in on the warlord — a United Nations Security Council report earlier this year said African Union troops are predicting Kony’s capture soon — that is cold comfort to Mrs. Wamoyi and her neighbors in Lango, a village around 200 miles north of the capital of Kampala.
“Even though the civil war has ended, the fighting between the rebels and the Ugandan soldiers left deep wounds in the society of northern Uganda,” said Annabelle Ogwang Okot, country manager of Diakonia, a Swedish human rights organization working in the area.
The Security Council report said Kony is becoming increasingly isolated as he hides in disputed territory on the borders of Sudan, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Congo. It noted that the rebel leader’s second-in-command, Okot Odhiambo, reportedly died in a skirmish last year, another Lord’s Resistance commander, Charles Okello, was captured in April, and members of the Lord's Resistance Army were increasingly deserting.
But catching Kony, even with the dispatch of U.S. Special Forces by President Obama in 2012 to aid in the search, has proven a frustrating mission. Some of those in the rebel forces say they haven’t heard from their leader for nearly a decade.
“I have not seen or communicated with our leader since 2008,” said Tom Ogola, a senior rebel commander who defected in August. “We believe that [Kony] exists, but we have not seen him for a long time.”
Since the 1990s Kony is estimated to have killed and abducted thousands, including around 30,000 children who were forced, often under the threat of dismemberment or death, to join the Lord's Resistance Army.
The fighters have been battling the Ugandan government in an attempt to establish a new state ruled by a mix of Christian fundamentalism and local African mysticism. In 2005 the International Criminal Court indicted Kony for a host of war crimes.
Today, African Union troops, with the help of the United States, have dispersed much of the Lord's Resistance Army — though they remain at large and occasionally attack villages in the region — and launched a massive dragnet to find the elusive leader.
The Obama administration is offering a $5 million reward for information leading to the warlord’s arrest. Earlier this year President Obama sent an additional contingent of military advisers and aircraft to help the search.
“The citizens of northern Uganda are hoping that the intervention of the U.S. government to send more troops and aircraft in the region will bear fruit and bring justice,” said Ms. Okot. “These people still live in fear of attack.”
Searing memories
In Lango and other villages in Uganda’s Gulu District, where Kony was born and launched his insurgency, everybody can easily summon up tales of kidnapped children, rape, murder, cut-off limbs, noses, ears and lips as well as the diseases spread by hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing the fighting between Kony’s forces and government troops.
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