The Congolese army is deploying troops in a remote northern border region to try to box in Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels and stop them attacking civilians, a UN military spokesman said on Tuesday. Lieutenant-Colonel Jean-Paul Dietrich said the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) was offering logistical support to what he called the army's "containment operation" against the LRA fighters.
Several hundred Congolese troops had already been sent to Dungu, on the edge of the Garamba National Park, an LRA stronghold near Congo's porous northern border with Sudan. A total of around 2,000 troops were expected to be deployed.
"The goal of this operation is to dissuade LRA elements from attacking the population of Congo's extreme north," Dietrich told Reuters. "This is a containment operation. It falls under MONUC's mandate to protect the civilian population," he added.
The LRA, led by self-proclaimed mystic Joseph Kony, has waged one of Africa's longest guerrilla wars against the Ugandan government. Harried by the Ugandan army, the rebels have sought shelter in Congo's northern forests and earlier this year raided Central African Republic, looting homes and abducting civilians.
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