Kampala — THE Congolese government has vowed to destroy the Lord's Resistance Army, marauding in its North-eastern region.
"We have decided to destroy the LRA," government spokesman, Lambert Mende Omalanga said on New Year's eve.
"We have given the LRA the chance to negotiate peace with the authorities in its country, but they have refused to sign. We cannot keep people in our territory who kill innocents civilians," Mende added, in an interview with AFP.
The LRA rebels led by the elusive Joseph Kony have been holed up in the densely-forested Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo since 2005 when they fled an onslaught by the UPDF in the north and south Sudan.
The Government and the rebels were involved in peace talks in Juba, South Sudan since July 14, 2006 to April 2008. However, Kony four times refused to sign the final peace agreement citing the International Criminal Court warrants of arrest for him and his commanders.
Tired of his no-shows and angered by his continued atrocities; Uganda, the DRC and Southern Sudan sent their armies to hunt down Kony in Garamba.
The military offensive code-named Operation Lightning Thunder was launched on December 14, 2008; with bombardment of LRA bases and para-trooping of commandos.
The fleeing rebels in the festive season turned their paranoia onto the civilians, killing 400 in Dungu, Doruma, Faradje, Bangadi and Gurba in the DRC and Maridi in Southern Sudan.
According to Caritas, an international Catholic aid agency working in Haut-Uele and Orientale province in the DRC, the massacres were conducted between December 24 and 27.
The UN's Security Council and the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon condemned the rebels for atrocities and urged them to respect the international humanitarian law.
The Archbishop of Dungu-Doroma in the north east Orientale province, Richard Domba, denounced what he said was the "indescribable savagery and barbaric acts" of the LRA.

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Ghana just held a free and fair elections. It should be a lesson to these fools that these dumb wars which serve only to enrich the illegitimate undemocratic governments in Kampala and weak ineffectual government in Kinshaha.
War is good business for these military juntas. In Uganda the price of petrol is rising while the oil prices are quarter of what they were only less than six months ago because of the juntas have to "finance" the war.
Kony has been a political and economic god send - the Museveni and NRM profiteers get to whip up political sentiments in their favor while raking unbelievable economic profits at the same time.
Watch the monetary inflationary pressures increase because they have to print money to "finance" the war.
One of the things that surprises me is the fact that the words of a Perfected Being, I refer to one who has achieved divine union with the Supreme Lord, a Perfect Saint, will always come true.
Just prior to and immediately after President Yoweri Museveni came to power January 1986, the Ugandan Native Perfect Born-Saint, His Imperishable Glory Bambi Baaba Baabuwee advised the new Ugandan leaders to consult with some contemporary Saint/s on how to end bloodshed in Uganda.
Just befeore the fall of Idi Amin in 1979, the said Born-Saint had long foretold in 1978, the coming of Yoweri Museveni to state power.
The Born-Saint warned that if the Ugandan government did not follow divine guidance with regard to the thousands of human skulls and bones that littered the Luweero Triangle for a sacred ceremony to be performed thereof, Uganda would continue in the agony of rebel insurgency and bloodshed for a long time.
The Ugandan government did not take the matter seriously. A few months after taking power January 26, 2986, Alice Lakwena's army killed many government soldiers and nearly reached Kampala before Lakwena was forced to flee to neighboring Kenya.
Joseph Kony, believed to have been Lakwena's righthand man, formed the Lord Resistance Army and started fighting Museveni's NRA which later turned into UPDF.
Some years the Allied Democratic Forces, another rebel rgouop was formed to fight againts Museveni's NRM and his government.
Over twenty years, LRA rebel insurgency has continued to destroy property and massacre thousands of civilians and soldiers in Northern Uganda.
Kony's onslaught has now combined the three neighboring countries of Uganda, Sudan and Congo with the recent death toll in Congo near to 400 people.
Recently the three neighboring nations had joined forces to hunt down the rebel leader Kony but have so far failed to capture him or his high-ranking officers.
Up until this day, the Ugandan government has sought to eliminate the LRA and the rebel insurgency by use of military force but Kony has been elusive for over two decades now.
Yet the contemporary Saint had offered a possible solution had the Ugandan government leaders listened and followed his guidance. They mistook the Saint for another of those Traditional African religionists.
A Perfect Saint is not so much of an ordinary human but more so an intra-being between God and Man and is therefore known to be the manifestation of the Divine in human form.
History shows how Napoloen Bonaparte and Alexander the Great made great successes as long as they each followed the guidance of some Living Saint of their time.
When each one of the two great men ignored the guidance, they each came to undesirable circumstances: Napoleon was arrested and deported to St Helena Island where he died in solitary confinement. Alexander the Great died of a high fever at age thirty three and took nothing with him- not even his huge conquests of power!
His expert medical doctor could do nothing to save his life.
At her inception, the United States received the guidance of a Living Saint who helped seal the new nation's future for greatness. This explains why many US presidents have been members of an esoteric order, the Free Masons.
Over two centuries now, the United States has grown into the world's largest power and leader in many other ways or aspects especially in sceince and technology.
Down the decades and centuries, US leaders have divorced themselves from the esoteric principles upon which the country was founded. The result is many mistakes have been made down the line.
Some people hope that President-Elect Barack Obama may be guided to the annals of the noble principles upon which America was founded and may lead the nation back on track to become the world leader she was meant to be, resulting into strides towards the formation of a one world government one world nation. If Barack Obama were to be so lucky as to consult a contemporary Divine Guardian, the US and the world will take a quantum leap into the future for world peace, harmony and faster scientific and technological development.
The lesson here in all of this is that divine guidance is impeccable and never fails. Those leaders who follow it reap rich rewards for their peoples and those who ignore it end up in shambles.
I believe Kony can be arrested either way; use of froce or vice versa if our leaders seek divine guidance. There are a few genuined Living Saints on earth today.
To find them is not so difficult but the humility and meekness or purpose necessary to consult them is.