UGANDA signed a deal to end two decades of war with the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels, raising hopes that almost two million people will return home after enduring the massacres and mass abduction of children that marked one of Africa’s longest wars.

The guerrillas agreed to leave their hideouts for two assembly points in south Sudan within three weeks while a final accord is negotiated by Uganda and representatives of Joseph Kony, the self-proclaimed prophet who is their leader.

An estimated 1.7 million people forced into overcrowded “protected camps” in northern Uganda under the Government’s counter-insurgency strategy, where disease claims hundreds of lives each month, are praying that the agreement will end 20 years of war. “They think there’s going to be peace,” said Moses Rubangangeyo, 25, who was abducted at 16 and spent eight years as a rebel fighter before escaping.

Any move by the rebels to leave the sanctuary of their camps in northern Uganda and the Congo would be an important sign of confidence in the process. A rebel delegation, drawn partly from northern Uganda’s large diaspora community in London, signed the agreement with Ugandan officials in Juba, the regional capital of southern Sudan, on Saturday, where talks began in July.

The deal also commits both sides to stop attacks when it comes into force on Tuesday.

Members of the rebel delegation say that Mr Kony will accompany his fighters to the assembly points, where south Sudanese troops will protect them. He has emerged from the closed world of his movement in recent months to meet southern Sudanese mediators on the border with Congo. But he had refused to attend talks in Juba for fear of arrest.

The International Criminal Court in The Hague issued its first indictments since it was set up in 2002 against Mr Kony and four of his commanders last October, charging them with war crimes.

Uganda, which referred Mr Kony to the court, has since pledged to shield him from prosecution, but the charges have complicated the task of mediators to persuade him that he will enjoy a comfortable retirement if he surrenders.

The indictments have also created a dilemma for Britain, which has supported previous talks but backs the attempts of the International Criminal Court to end impunity for war crimes. In Uganda elders want to use traditional reconciliation rituals rather than cells in The Hague to heal divisions created by the war, which began after President Museveni seized power in 1986 by overthrowing a junta of generals from Mr Kony’s native north.

WAR CHILDREN

About 100,000 have died in the conflict

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