Uganda's government and Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels signed a cease-fire on Saturday in another major step towards a final peace settlement to their two-decade war that mediators say may be signed next week.
"It is the laying down of arms. It is the end of the war," UN envoy Joaquim Chissano said after the parties signed the "permanent cease-fire" agreement during their fast-progressing talks in southern Sudan's capital Juba.
With only a demobilisation deal left to be agreed on, negotiators and mediators like Chissano are predicting a final accord will be reached within days to end one of Africa's longest-running and most macabre conflicts. Saturday's deal prohibits any recruitment or rearmament by the LRA, or movement beyond an assembly area in south Sudan. The cease-fire, formalising a cessation of hostilities agreed in August 2006, creates a 10 km- (6 mile-) deep buffer-zone around the LRA assembly area, guarded by southern Sudanese troops.