The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is a Ugandan rebel group currently operating in the border region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the Central African Republic (CAR), and South Sudan. Joseph Kony established the LRA in 1988 with the claim of restoring the honor of his ethnic Acholi people and to install a government based on his personal version of the Ten Commandments. Kony claims to channel various spirits who direct him to oust Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni; however, under Kony’s leadership, LRA soldiers conduct violence for the sake of violence, primarily against civilians, rather than fighting to advance a political agenda. Since 2005, the LRA is believed to have committed hundreds of attacks resulting in well over 5,000 deaths and considerably more wounded and kidnapped.

The LRA has its roots in the conflict between the Acholi tribe of northern Uganda and other tribes in southern Uganda that began during Idi Amin Dada’s regime (1971-1979). Power changed hands between two equally ruthless Acholi leaders after Idi Amin was overthrown, but the Acholi were forced to flee back to the north when Museveni seized power in 1986. Alienated Acholi troops subsequently formed a less extreme Holy Spirit movement to counter the Ugandan government. However, following their defeat in 1988, a more violent movement—the LRA—emerged under Kony. LRA soldiers quickly gained a reputation for murder, torture, rape, and mutilations aimed primarily at Acholi communities, as well as abducting tens of thousands of children over the years to use as sex slaves and child soldiers.

In 2008, following Kony’s refusal to sign a negotiated peace agreement, Ugandan, DRC, and southern Sudanese armies launched a joint military offensive, “Operation Lightning Thunder,” against the LRA in northeastern Congo. The operation succeeded in cutting off supplies and destroying some of the main camps but ultimately failed to capture or kill LRA leaders. As a result, the LRA broke up into smaller, more mobile groups and spread out in the border region, making them even more difficult to locate, while they conducted attacks on the run.

In May 2010 the US Congress passed the “Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act,” which follows the US State Department inclusion of the LRA on the Terrorist Exclusion List in 2001 and designation of Joseph Kony as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist under Executive Order 13224 in 2008. In October 2011 the United States sent a force of 100 soldiers—in an advisory role—to regional militaries aimed
at removing Kony from the battlefield.

On 22 November 2011, the African Union (AU) formally esignated the LRA a terrorist group and authorized an initiative to enhance regional cooperation toward its elimination. In March 2012, the AU launched its own military force to assist regional efforts against the LRA.