UGANDA: Rebels abducted 30 schoolgirls in Uganda in a raid in the east of the country on Monday night, an army spokesman said yesterday.
The rebels are fighting to install a regime guided by the Bible's 10 commandments.
The girls seized in the ambush on the Lwala Girls Secondary School in Kabermaido district, about 160km north-east of the capital, Kampala, were aged between 12 and 18.
The rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), led by self-proclaimed prophet Joseph Kony, has been fighting the government in northern Uganda since 1987.
The group has earned a terrifying reputation for abducting children to use as child soldiers and sex slaves, and for maiming villagers.
Army spokesman Maj Shaban Bantariza said initial fears that 100 girls had been taken have been scaled down, but added that around 30 were still unaccounted for.
"We now think that the girls herded away by the LRA are about 30," Mr Bantariza said.
There were further reports last night that about 13 girls had escaped.
The LRA has generally been most active in northern Uganda, but in the past week attacks further south of its traditional area of operation have caused mounting concern.
"This is the greatest level of insecurity the rebels have created in the last 17 years," opposition MP Mr Aggrey Awori told Ugandan radio. "The rebels seem to be getting stronger and the army is unable to handle the situation."
Hours after the raid on the school, the rebels ambushed a Kampala-bound bus a few kilometres south, killing one person and injuring several.