LRA Agrees to Protect Rare Wildlife

In what is being billed as the first agreement of its kind, the LRA has pledged to protect rare wildlife in a remote park it occupies in eastern Congo, including rare pygmy giraffe and what are thought to be the last four northern white rhinos in the wild:

In an apparent bid to burnish their brutal reputation, the Lord’s Resistance Army vowed to assist efforts to conserve endangered species in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Garamba National Park, where rebel leaders are holed up.

Under an unusual agreement inked on the sidelines of peace talks in southern Sudan, the LRA promised to protect the rhinos as well an estimated 40 rare pygmy giraffes and an unknown number of threatened okapis.

“The statistics we were shown were devastating and shocked us, and so we have given a tacit commitment that we will do whatever possible to live in harmony with the animals,” said Martin Ojul, head of the LRA delegation to the talks.

“We will act as their curators and do everything possible to see that they are not harmed for posterity,” he told AFP.

In addition to protecting the wildlife, the agreement includes assurances from LRA supremo Joseph Kony, who has been hiding in Garamba just over the DRC’s eastern border with Sudan for months, that his fighters would not attack game wardens.

“We wish to assure the rangers in Garamba Park that, provided they properly identify themselves and not attack us, we undertake to fully cooperate with them,” says the pact, which was signed by Ojul on Sunday with Kony’s authority.

There is no question that the LRA’s motives in signing the agreement are far from selfless; as the article notes, the LRA believes the agreement will help convince the international community that the numerous allegations against it are untrue. And there is no guarantee that the LRA will honor its agreement.

Even if it doesn’t, though, the agreement is an important reminder that human conflict harms more than just humans.