Uganda offers amnesty window to ADF rebels

Uganda announced an amnesty offer on Wednesday for Allied Democratic Forces (ADF rebels in exchange for their abandonment of rebellion activities against the government, a state spokesperson said.

The government has provided a window of amnesty for individuals who were recruited into the terrorist ranks of the ADF rebel outfit but now wish to surrender and cease their fight against innocent Ugandans, said Chris Baryomunsi, Minister of Information and Communications Technology and National Guidance serving as the cabinet spokesperson.

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“We want to announce that window for them to apply for amnesty, abandon the ADF, and come out. They will be given amnesty in accordance with the law,” Baryomunsi told reporters without specifying the time frame.

The data from the Amnesty Commission of the Ugandan government indicate that more than 30,000 ex-rebels who took up arms against the state have been granted amnesty since the establishment of the commission in 2000.

“Should you not be interested in that, then you can wait for the firepower from the UPDF (Uganda People’s Defense Forces and Ugandan forces,” Baryomunsi added, emphasising that the hunt for ADF rebels is ongoing, and they will be pursued until they are defeated, similar to the way the Lord’s Resistance Army led by Joseph Kony was defeated.

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The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA was a Ugandan rebel group that waged a 20-year-long insurgency until it was driven out of the country by the military in 2006 after failed peace talks.

The rebel group fled to neighbouring South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC and the Central African Republic. Ugandan troops, in collaboration with their DRC counterparts, have been jointly combating ADF rebels since November 2021.