MACHAR PROPOSES TO WAIT OUT LRA'S KONY

UNCLAS KHARTOUM 001582 DEPT FOR AF A/S FRAZER, SE WILLIAMSON, AF/SPG NSC FOR PITTMAN AND HUDSON DEPT PLS PASS USAID FOR AFR/SUDAN SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ASEC PGOV PREL KPKO SOCI AU UNSC SU SUBJECT: MACHAR PROPOSES TO WAIT OUT LRA'S KONY ¶1. (SBU) Summary: In an October 22 meeting with ConGen Juba, GOSS Vice President Riek Machar said that The Lord's Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony had stopped communicating with him, and that he would not try to talk to him again until Kony reached out to him. Machar said he believes Kony is running short on supplies, and that all that is needed is to wait him out. In the meantime, Machar believes the LRA is really the DRC's problem and not that of South Sudan. Thinking out loud for a moment, Machar wondered if it might not be best to give Kony a one year deferment of the ICC warrants to induce him to sign a peace accord. Machar then rejected his own musing, partly based on the fact that he thought it would send the wrong message to GNU President Omar al Bashir. End summary. ¶2. (SBU) Machar told ConGen Juba that UN Special Envoy Joaquim Chisanno would be in Juba to meet with him to compare notes on LRA issues on October 28. He said that LRA leader Joseph Kony had stopped communicating with both him and Chisanno, and that that they had essentially given up on trying to induce Kony to sign the Juba Peace Accord. "We are now waiting for him to contact us; we are not going to try to contact him anymore," said Machar. ¶3. (SBU) Machar said he has not given up on the LRA peace process, despite a lack of contact with Kony. The food that was to have been delivered to Kony in September was, in the end, never sent, and Kony is running very short on supplies of all kinds. "If he gets no help from outside sources, he's going to have to reach out to us again." Asked if he thought that Kony was being supplied by the NCP as a means of destabilizing the South, Machar said he did not think so because the logistics of getting things to Kony in the DRC are very difficult and would very likely be detected. ¶4. (SBU) Asked if he was willing to consider military options against Kony, Machar (as he always does) demurred. "It's Congo's and Uganda's problem right now. Why risk Sudanese lives and provoke Kony into a fight when we can try to wait him out? My first priority is to protect Sudanese lives. Let Kony remain in Congo. Hunger will force him to reach out eventually. I don't want a war we can avoid. I've seen enough of that." Machar said he believes that, strategically, if the DRC and Uganda go after Kony and Sudan stays out of it, then Sudan remains a door to peace that Kony can still open if he wants to do so. Keeping options on the table was, he said, the best means to finding an end to the conflict. ¶5. (SBU) Thinking out loud about options, Machar speculated that perhaps the UNSC ought to suspend the ICC indictments against Kony for a year to see if that would entice him into finally signing the peace accord. Machar then rejected that option himself on the grounds that not only was it highly unlikely that the UNSC would do it, but also it would send the wrong message to GNU President Bashir. ¶6. (SBU) Comment: It is interesting that Machar rejected the idea of suspending ICC warrants against Kony on the basis that it would send the wrong message to Bashir. Machar obviously believes that ICC indictments against Bashir put pressure on the NCP, which Machar views as being useful. Many in the SPLM (including Salva Kiir) fear that indictments could push Bashir into taking dangerous actions, such as suspending the National Assembly and ruling Sudan by decree, while others believe that it is at least partially bluffing. It is somewhat surprising that Machar, instead, favors a warrant as a means of pressuring the NCP. There is a great deal of dark speculation in South Sudan that Machar himself is working in league with the NCP against GOSS President Kiir. Favoring ICC indictments against Bashir would seem to argue that this is not at all the case, though Machar may actually benefit from instability in GNU, seeking perhaps to interpose himself as a guarantor of security in the oil producing Nuer majority regions of Unity and Upper Nile States. FERNANDEZ