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60 dead in cattle fight
A military spokesperson in the area, Lieutenant David Kazoola, confirmed the incident, but could not say how many people died. He said the army had arrested some local militias in the area who were trained to guard against raids, but are themselves suspected of engaging in cattle rustling. A spokesperson of the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), Lillian Nsubuga, said the battles had taken place far from the tourism zone in Kidepo park. "The Kidepo National Park is rich in rare animals and because such battles between cattle raiders occur in that part of the country, we normally fly tourists to the park," Nsubuga said. Karamoja, referred to as Uganda's "wild west" for its cattle rustling violence that has killed thousands of people, is in the middle of a region which has a steady supply of small arms coming from the Turkana pastoralists in Kenya and also from southern Sudan, where a series of civil wars has raged since independence in 1956. It is one of Uganda's least developed regions. Cattle are a major item in the Karamojongs' value system, and they often carry out bloody raids against rival tribes for cattle. Raiders believe that a male attains real manhood if he participates in cattle raids, and that anyone killed during such attacks has died "a sacred death". A government exercise to disarm the Karamojong has managed to recover slightly over ten thousands guns, but many are believed to still remain in the hands of the warriors. Posted by: Dan Darling 2004-03-20 |
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