International court convicts ex-child soldier of war crimes

THE HAGUE, Netherlands -- The International Criminal Court on Thursday convicted a one-time child soldier who morphed into a brutal commander in the notorious Ugandan rebel group the Lord's Resistance Army of dozens of war crimes and crimes against humanity, ranging from multiple murders to forced marriages.

Dominic Ongwen, who was abducted by the shadowy militia as a 9-year-old boy and transformed into a child soldier and later promoted to a senior leadership rank, faces a maximum punishment of life imprisonment after being convicted of 61 offenses.

The judgment, which can be appealed, outlined the horrors of the Lord's Resistance Army's attacks on camps for displaced civilians in northern Uganda in the early 2000s, and of Ongwen's abuse of women who were forced to be his "wives." Activists welcomed his convictions for crimes against women, which included rape, forced pregnancy and sexual slavery.

Defense lawyers had argued that Ongwen was a "victim and not a victim and perpetrator at the same time."

But Presiding Judge Bertram Schmitt rejected those arguments, saying: "This case is about crimes committed by Dominic Ongwen as a fully responsible adult, as a commander of the [Lord's Resistance Army] in his mid- to late 20s."

Schmitt described the reign of terror unleashed by the Lord's Resistance Army, which was founded and led by one of the world's most-wanted war crimes suspects, Joseph Kony.

Female civilians captured by the group were turned into sex slaves and wives for fighters. The rebel group made children into soldiers. Men, women and children were murdered in attacks on camps for internally displaced people.

"Civilians were shot, burned and beaten to death," Schmitt said as he detailed a May 2004 attack on a camp in the Ugandan village of Lukodi carried out by fighters commanded by Ongwen.

Kony promoted Ongwen to the rank of colonel after the attack.

Ongwen showed no emotion as the verdicts were read in court. Usually, defendants are ordered to stand as the presiding judge reads out the verdicts. In Ongwen's case, there were so many that he was allowed to remain seated.

Reacting to the convictions, the International Criminal Court's prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, said her thoughts were with victims of Lord's Resistance Army atrocities.

Bensouda acknowledged that Ongwen was once a victim but said he grew into "one of the most senior military leaders, fervently committed to the [Lord's Resistance Army] cause with infamous brutality. As an adult, he was personally responsible for encouraging and committing against others the very crimes that he himself suffered as a child. As proven at trial, he was also a direct perpetrator of terrible sexual violence, including against young girls, some of whom were forcibly 'married' to him."

The Lord's Resistance Army, which began in Uganda as an anti-government rebellion, is accused of atrocities including mass killings, recruiting boys to fight and keeping girls as sex slaves. At the peak of its power, the group was a notoriously brutal outfit whose members for years eluded Ugandan forces in the bushland of northern Uganda.

When military pressure forced the group out of Uganda in 2005, the rebels scattered across parts of central Africa. Reports over the years have claimed Kony was hiding in Sudan's Darfur region or in a remote corner of Central African Republic, where Lord's Resistance Army fighters continued to kill and abduct in occasional raids on villages, and where Ongwen was arrested in 2015.

Kony became internationally notorious in 2012 when the U.S.-based advocacy group Invisible Children made a viral video highlighting the group's crimes. By that time the group had already been weakened by defections as it splintered into smaller, highly mobile groups. Uganda's military estimated in 2013 that the group comprised no more than a few hundred fighters.

Invisible Children said this week that 108 children abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army remain missing.

Information for this article was contributed by Rodney Muhumuza of The Associated Press.