US sanctions 'Lord's Resistance Army' and leader

By Esra Kaymak Avci

WASHINGTON

The U.S. has announced sanctions on the central African Lord’s Resistance Army militia and its leader, Joseph Kony, for targeting innocent civilians.

The U.S. Treasury Department said late on Tuesday that the moves were taken as the group had been involved in “acts of violence, abduction and forced displacement” against civilians in the Central African Republic.

"From murdering innocent civilians to pillaging villages, the Lord’s Resistance Army (or LRA) is responsible for notorious acts of violence," said the Treasury's Acting Director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control, John Smith.

The sanctions aim to freeze "any LRA assets within U.S. jurisdiction and generally prohibits U.S. persons from engaging in transactions with the group," according to the statement.

Tuesday's announcement complements the previous day's listing of Kony and the LRA by UN Security Council Resolution 2262.

Kony has previously been designated a 'Specially Designated Global Terrorist' in August 2008. In addition, the U.S. Department of State included the LRA on the Terrorism Exclusion List in 2001.

Having emerged in northern Uganda in the 1980s, the LRA has engaged in abduction and mutilation of thousands of civilians across central Africa, the statement said.

Media reports also say that the group has abducted around 20,000 children since 1980s to either enslave them or to train them as fighters.

In 2006 the group withdrew from Uganda due to increasing military pressure there and has since been operating since on the borders of Sudan and South Sudan as well as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and South Sudan.