[allAfrica.com] Uganda Invites Congo to Oil-Sharing Talks East African (Nairobi) NEWS 14 August 2007 Posted to the web 14 August 2007 By Barbara Among Nairobi The Ugandan army has confirmed that it is deploying heavily along the common border with the Democratic Republic of Congo and that it has asked for permission to cross the border to stem insecurity after a series of attacks on its territory by the Congolese army and suspected militias. An unidentified armed group attacked Butogota town in Kanungu district in western Uganda on Wednesday morning, killed three people, injured several others and looted shops in the area in a siege that lasted several hours. The latest attack could strain relations between the two countries, coming as it does on the heels of high-level meetings between military and intelligence chiefs from both countries to discuss the capture of four Ugandan soldiers and the killing of a British oil prospector by suspected Congolese government soldiers on July 29 and August 3 respectively. The commander of the UPDF's land force, Maj-Gen. Katumba Wamala confirmed to The EastAfrican on Friday morning that Uganda had sent more troops to the border and had asked for permission to pursue the latest group of attackers. "We are beefing up security at the border until we establish who the real actors are and what their intentions are," Maj-Gen. Wamala said. "There is a lot of talk going on at the diplomatic level and we have raised our concerns with them." The commander also told this newspaper that Kampala was asking Kinshasa to allow it to send in troops across the border to wipe out the insurgents. Although a US-brokered tripartite agreement signed between Uganda, Rwanda and the DRC allows joint operations, President Joseph Kabila's government has refused previous requests by Uganda for joint operations against the Allied Democratic Front rebels in the Rwenzori area, and the Lord's Resistance Army rebels, who have bases in Garamba, northeast DRC. "We gave them the benefit of doubt and they have been responding," Maj. Gen Wamala said. "I don't think they would want to see their country used by these elements to cause havoc." The latest attacks came a day after Kampala wrote to Kinshasa inviting the DRC officials for talks over a disputed border island in Lake Albert, in an area where exploration teams have recently found commercially-viable deposits of oil and natural gas. The invitation was seen as directly arising out of the incidents in which Congolese soldiers abducted four Ugandan soldiers on July 29 and opened fire on an oil-prospecting barge on the lake a few days later, killing the British oil explorer. A previous meeting in Entebbe of army chiefs from both countries - Uganda's Chief of Defence Forces Gen Aronda Nyakairima and his DRC counterpart Lt-Gen Dieudonne Kayembe - had failed to resolve the matter. Military sources who attended the meeting said while it had helped cool tensions between the two countries, it did not address the underlying issues behind the clashes. These critical issues are understood to be the sharing of any oil that may be found in the border region in and around Lake Albert, as well as the ownership of the disputed Rukwanzi Island. The Entebbe meeting, which was also attended by intelligence chiefs from both countries and was facilitated by the commander of the UN Mission to Congo (MONUC), Lt-Gen. Babacar Gaye, resolved to send a bilateral team from both countries to investigate the killing and the kidnapping of the Ugandan soldiers - who were released last week after an ultimatum from Kampala to Kinshasa. A military source who attended the Entebbe meeting told The EastAfrican that the military chiefs had resolved to pass the matter over to the politicians. "The problem is not only about security; it has nothing to do with the militias," a senior Ugandan military official who attended the meeting said. "Actually, the current attacks can only be handled by the political leadership." James Mugume, the Permanent Secretary in Uganda's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, confirmed to The EastAfrican that Kampala had written to Kinshasa and demanded an explanation of the attacks, and that high-level follow up meetings were planned to discuss the matter further. "The explanation we got is that the attacks were not ordered from Kinshasa but the people on the ground did not understand that the workers and soldiers were in Uganda," Mr Mugume told The East- African. "They thought we had crossed over to the Congo side. The attack took place four to five kilometres away from the border." These attacks are not the first in the area; the Congolese army arrested 30 Ugandan fishermen last July and detained them for two weeks allegedly for crossing into its waters. However, the discovery of oil in the region over the past 12 months has raised the stakes over Lake Albert and the surrounding areas. Lake Albert, which lies on the floor of the western arm of the Rift Valley, straddles the Uganda-Congo border in an area where two companies, Heritage of Canada and Tullow of the UK, are prospecting for oil. Heritage owns two concessions in a 50-50 partnership with UK-based Tullow Oil on the lake's eastern shores in Uganda while Tullow also wholly owns one block. Heritage also owns an exploration license in DRC but has not yet started prospecting there. A senior Ugandan government official told The EastAfrican that Kinshasa "suspects that we are encroaching on their oil wells" and had ordered the attacks "to send a message." The proposed talks between the two countries, which officials say are likely to involve the two foreign ministers, Uganda's Sam Kutesa and DRC's Mbusa Nyamwisi, will revisit a 1990 agreement that outlines shared use of the oil zones. The agreement foresaw a joint concessionaire operating along the common border and considered a joint investment by both countries with a view to sharing revenue. Significantly, both countries agreed to view the national boundaries as non- existent for the "purposes of oil exploitation based on goodwill and regular consultation." Officials close to the matter told The EastAfrican that President Joseph Kabila's government, which is struggling to recover from a decade of war, and which has limited control over the eastern areas of the country, is anxious to register its claims to the area, should oil deposits be found on its side of the border. Uganda's Energy Minister Daudi Migereko told The EastAfrican that Kampala was willing to revisit the joint-exploration agreement, over which the two countries last met in 1998, before deposits were found in Uganda. "We have written to the Congolese government indicating that we would like to work together," he added. Gen. Nyakairima confirmed that the Entebbe meeting had resolved to recommend to the two governments a joint investigation of recent incidents. Ugandan and Rwandan forces invaded DR Congo twice in the 1990s to overthrow the governments of the late Mobutu Sese Seko and Laurent Kabila, which they accused of supporting or not doing enough to flush out rebel groups opposed to the two countries. The invasions left Congo littered with armed militias that still hold sway in parts of the east and a civil war that left an estimated 1.5 million people dead and millions more displaced from their homes. Kampala accuses Kinshasa of not doing enough to flush out militias hostile to Uganda as well as the LRA. Negative elements operate on Congolese territory," UPDF army spokesman Maj Felix Kulayigye told The EastAfrican. "In various forums, Congo has been asked to ensure these groups leave their territory and they have not been able to make them leave. As long as they are there, they pose a threat to the people. It is a concern for the UPDF," he added. It is feared that further attacks at the border might lead to a clash between Ugandan and Congolese forces, which could spark another war in the region. =============================================================================== Copyright © 2007 East African. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). ===============================================================================