Dear President Bashir:

I am deeply disturbed by widespread and credible reports (documented by UNICEF, World Vision, Human Rights Watch, and Amnesty International) of the Lord's Resistance Army's abduction, torture, rape and killing of thousands of Ugandan children. The LRA's treatment of children shocks the conscience and must not be tolerated by the international community and the government of Sudan.

Children who had recently escaped from LRA captivity have reported to a wide range of credible sources that they were brought across the Ugandan border to LRA base camps in southern Sudan, where they were trained and armed to fight. They reported that the Sudanese army supplied the LRA with food supplies, vehicles, and a steady flow of arms. In return, the LRA, and the abducted children who form the bulk of the LRA forces, are used to fight against the Sudanese rebel group, the SPLA. Through the government of Sudan's support of the LRA, and its use of the LRA to fight against the SPLA, your government is complicit in the LRA's outrageous conduct against Ugandan children.

I appeal to the Sudanese government to cease all military aid and other support of the LRA until the LRA stops abducting children and releases all child captives. Whatever differences exist between the governments of Sudan and Uganda, and the armed rebel groups enjoying their support, you must stand firm against the LRA's abhorrent treatment of Ugandan children. Please use your influence with the LRA to put an end to this shameful and extreme example of the targetting of children in war.
 

Sincerely yours,