Uganda rebel 'to sign peace deal'

Joseph Kony is accused of numerous war crimes

Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army rebel leader Joseph Kony is meeting tribal elders before signing a deal to end Uganda's 20-year rebellion.

The chief mediator, Riek Machar, is waiting for the LRA leader close to the Congolese border.

But Mr Kony has failed to show up at previous signing ceremonies, fearing for his safety.

Earlier, Uganda's government said it would ask for arrest warrants for Mr Kony to be lifted if he signed.

But Ugandan Foreign Minister Sam Kutesa made it clear that Mr Kony must sign the deal first before the issue of the International Criminal Court (ICC) was addressed.

"We were only prepared to talk to the ICC about an alternative method of resolving that dispute, and also of justice in the country, only if peace is going to come to the people of northern Uganda," he told the BBC's World Today programme.

I think that the UN Security Council would facilitate because the alternative is to have Kony forever in the jungles of Congo UN mediator Joachim Chissano Congo terror after LRA rebel raids

He added that as far as the government was concerned Mr Kony was the only serious obstacle to a final peace agreement being signed by the two sides.

"Our people are ready to sign any time, but Kony is the one who has been eluding us," he said.

But Joachim Chissano, Mozambique's former president, told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that he understood Mr Kony was heading to the signing ceremony in Ri Kwangba in South Sudan from his jungle hideout in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Other signatories from northern Uganda were also on their way to Ri Kwangba, just north of Sudan's border with DR Congo.

Optimistic

The UN special envoy said he could not guarantee that Mr Kony would sign this time, but he was optimistic.

"I don't have reasons to doubt that he'll not show up, because all the indications which he gave coming up to now are encouraging so I'm more confident than a few weeks ago," he said.

A one-year suspension by UN Security Council of the arrest warrants would give the government time to prove that it was able to deal with the matter, Mr Chissano said.

"I think that the UN Security Council would facilitate because the alternative is to have Kony forever in the jungles of Congo."

The LRA has led a rebellion for more than 20 years which has displaced some two million people in northern Uganda.