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Bomb attack against two children in Uganda

Ugandan child in Kampala Ugandan child in Kampala Stijn Kleerebezem on Pexels

30 October 2021

The recent escalation of violence has led Ugandan authorities to investigate the attacks and identify the perpetrators

On Friday 29 October, a bomb attack killed two children in Nakaseke district, 60 km north of Kampala. According to the local police, the device was shaped like exotic fruit and was given to the children while they were playing.

In the span of a week, Uganda has been targeted by three bomb attacks. The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, known as ISIL (ISIS), claimed responsibility for the blast which occurred last October 23 in a popular restaurant in Kampala that caused the death of one person and wounded three others. A few days later, a second bomb planted on a bus killed the suspected attacker and injured several people. Ugandan authorities are investigating the attacks as no responsibility was immediately claimed for Friday’s bomb. The Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), suspected of links to ISIL, emerged as the possible author of the blasts. The ADF born as a coalition of Ugandan armed groups that opposed Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni – gained notoriety for a string of attacks carried out in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). In 2019, some ADF attacks were claimed by ISIL, which presented the armed group as its regional branch.

Uganda has recently been the focus of attention over the Ongwen case, which was brought before the International Criminal Court (ICC). Dominic Ongwen was a former Ugandan child soldier who subsequently became commander in the rebel group Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). Last February, he was convicted by the ICC and sentenced to 25 years in prison for 61 counts of crimes, including crimes against humanity and war crimes, committed in northern Uganda between 2002 and 2005.

 

To read more, please visit:

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/10/30/fruit-shaped-bomb-kills-two-children-in-uganda-police

https://www.reuters.com/article/uganda-security-idAFL1N2RP31G

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-57009970

https://www.icc-cpi.int/uganda/ongwen

 

Author: Antonella Candiago; Editor: Xavier Atkins

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