700 Ugandan troops to join regional force

The Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) on Tuesday started sending another 2,754 fresh troops to Somalia under the command of a newly appointed Ugandan contingent commander to the African Union Mission to Somalia.

Burundi’s government said Sunday it would not agree to the deployment of African Union (AU) peacekeepers, warning that they would be seen as “an invasion force”.

Ugandan troops have killed 41 gunmen in a major battle with tribal gunmen in the western district of Bundibuguyo near the border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda’s army spokesman said today.

>Ugandan troops have been killed fighting alongside South Sudan’s army, President Yoweri Museveni has said, the first official confirmation that foreign forces have an active combat role in the war-ravaged young nation.

Former vice president Gilbert Bukenya has said he will join a united Opposition to generate a momentum that will oust President Yoweri Museveni from power in 2016.

>A new United Nations report on the atrocities of war committed by both South Sudan government forces and rebels loyal to former vice president Riek Machar has sucked the UPDF in the use of cluster bombs in the conflict.

Sudan Tribune
Uganda to deploy over 700 regional forces: report
Sudan Tribune
June 29, 2014 (KAMPALA) - Uganda has accepted to deploy 736 troops to the East African intervention force for rapid response to regional conflicts, the media reported. JPEG - 84.2 kb; Uganda leader Yoweri Museveni Kaguta (New Vision photo). Uganda's ...
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Burundi faces mounting regional pressure to accept African Union peacekeepers it calls an “invasion force”, diplomats said Wednesday, with the issue a key point of talks due in Uganda next week.

Rwanda will not contribute troops to a peacekeeping mission in neighbouring Burundi, President Paul Kagame said, as he rejected claims his country was arming refugees as rebels.