The Lords Resistance Army (LRA) rebels
killed one soldier and wounded six others in an ambush of a Central
African Republic (CAR) army convoy in the remote east, local and defence
officials said on Tuesday.
Ugandan
soldiers hunting for fugitive warlord Joseph Kony deep in the Central
African Republic jungle patrol the area. (AP Photo/Rodney Muhumuza)
Ugandan troops and U.S. Special
Forces advisers are helping poorly trained and equipped local forces
attempting to end one of the world’s longest-running armed insurgencies,
which has killed thousands of civilians across four African nations.
The four-truck convoy was on its
way to the town of Obo, near the porous eastern borders with South
Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo, when it was attacked by rebels
on Monday.
“They fell into the LRA ambush
177 km from (Obo). One was killed and six were seriously wounded and
have just been evacuated,” local government official Albert Boris
Mbagalet told Reuters.
A defence ministry spokesman in
the capital Bangui confirmed the attack and said the soldiers had been
part of an advanced team meant to prepare the way for a larger, African
Union-backed deployment planned for Wednesday.
“The ambushed soldiers were
preceding a contingent of 500 other soldiers who were to take the road
tomorrow for the official start of anti-LRA operations under the aegis
of the African Union,” Lt-Col Jean Ladawa told Reuters.
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