Ugandan forces 'kill 25 rebels'

The LRA rebels are notorious for their brutality

Uganda says its army has killed at least 25 fighters from the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in an operation to capture rebel leader Joseph Kony.

Attack helicopters were used in the cross-border raid in southern Sudan, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni said.

He said seven rebels were captured in the area, where the Sudanese government has permitted Uganda's army to operate.

The claim is hard to verify but the LRA has clearly been weakened recently, the BBC's Will Ross in Kampala says.

Rebel 'desperation'

He adds that rebel attacks on civilians have not ended but, in recent months, the level of atrocities committed by the LRA has significantly reduced.

At the same time, some rebels have taken advantage of an amnesty offer and surrendered their weapons.

Ugandan Defence Minister Amama Mbabazi told the BBC the success of recent offensives against the rebels was down to increased military spending and better co-operation from the Sudanese authorities.

President Museveni has said recent indications that key rebel commanders want to take up an offer of peace talks is a mark of their desperation.

'Gone to hell'

The latest raid on alleged rebel positions in southern Sudan took place near a town called Pakanyara, 160km (100 miles) north of the Ugandan border.

The LRA leader is believed to have sought refuge in the Imatong hills nearby recently.

Mr Museveni said the raid resulted in the capture of Mr Kony's bodyguard and his intelligence officer.

He said Mr Kony's second-in-command, Vincent Otti, may have been killed in another raid earlier in September.

"Either he [Mr Otti] is very seriously injured or he may have gone to hell where he belongs," Mr Museveni told the Reuters news agency.

The LRA's exact aims are uncertain - beyond an apparent commitment to a hardline Christian state - but it has fought in northern Uganda for more than a decade.

About 1.5 million people have been displaced by the conflict, which gained notoriety for the LRA's massacres and its tactic of kidnapping children for use as soldiers and slaves.