Ugandan rebel murder ambush sparks fierce retort

Rebels in northern Uganda ambushed a truckload of civilians that included school children and killed seven people, prompting an army counterattack that left three rebels dead, officials said today.

The Lord’s Resistance Army staged the attack near Kalongo, 235 miles north of Kampala on Thursday night, said Morris Ogenga Latigo, the area member of parliament. He said three children and four men were killed.

A spokesman for the army in the region, Capt. Paddy Ankunda, confirmed the attack. “We made a pursuit and a counterattack a few hours later and killed three rebels,” he said.

The rebels hold no territory inside Uganda, but move in small groups of between 10 and 20 to elude government forces. The group has little contact with the outside world and were not reachable for comment on the ambush.

Uganda’s northern civil war broke out shortly after President Yoweri Museveni’s National Resistance Movement took power in 1986. Rebels leaders have said they want to overthrow Museveni and replace the constitution with the Bible’s Ten Commandments.

But the rebellion has been marked mostly by rebel attacks on civilians and the abduction of thousands of children, who are trained as rebel soldiers or become concubines.

Recent attempts to negotiate an end to the fighting, which has spread into southern Sudan, have failed and efforts are underway to restart peace talks.