WASHINGTON -- A friend, the head of a major aid organization, tells of
how his workers in eastern Congo a few years ago chanced upon a group of
shell-shocked women and children in the bush. A militia had kidnapped a
number of families and forced the women to kill their husbands with
machetes, under the threat that their sons and daughters would be murdered
if they refused. Afterward the women were raped by more than 100 soldiers;
the children were spectators at their own, private genocide.
This is ultimately the work and trademark of a single man: Joseph
Kony, the most carnivorous killer since Idi Amin. As the military and
spiritual leader of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), Kony is a combination
of serial murderer and cult leader. He raises armies of captured boys, who
are often forced to kill their neighbors and engage in cannibalism to sever
all their ties of community and conscience. Girls are kidnapped into sexual
and domestic slavery. Kony has a messiah complex -- all must prostrate
themselves in his presence -- but he is a messiah in reverse, who sheds his
humanity instead of assuming it.
After a decade-long campaign of intimidation in northern Uganda that
displaced more than 1.5 million people into camps, Kony finally seemed to
be cornered and running out of options. Chased into the Garamba National
Park of northeastern Congo, Kony's emissaries entered peace talks two years
ago and promised demobilization.
A peace agreement ceremony was set for April 10 in the Sudanese town
of Ri-Kwangba near the Congo border. Hundreds of delegates, journalists and
observers arrived. But after a series of confused excuses -- too many
people, not enough security -- it became clear that Kony had no intention
of showing up or giving up. "The people speaking for Kony, it turned out,
weren't speaking for Kony at all," says a frustrated U.S. official.
In fact, Kony has used the peace-negotiation lull to rebuild his
power. He has issued orders to abduct 1,000 new "recruits" from Congo, the
Central African Republic and south Sudan. Since late February, he has begun
training between 200 and 300 kidnapped children at a camp in northeastern
Congo. Agents of the LRA in the region have supplied satellite phones,
tents, generators and uniforms. LRA forces have dug up weapons caches,
attacked barracks in south Sudan to obtain weapons, and established at
least six new bases along the Sudanese border.
Michael Gerson
Michael Gerson writes a twice-weekly column for The Post on issues that include politics, global health, development, religion and foreign policy. Michael Gerson is the author of the book "
Heroic Conservatism" and a contributor to Newsweek magazine.
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