First Kill Your Family Child Soldiers of Uganda and the Lord's Resistance Army

Told through the voices of those who have suffered, this illuminating exposeacute; examines how a forgotten region of one of Africa's most promising nations -- Uganda, dubbed "the pearl" of Africa by Winston Churchill -- has been systematically destroyed by a bloody, senseless, and seemingly endless war that has gone largely unnoticed by the rest of the world. For the past 20 years, the Lord's Resistance Army has ravaged northern Uganda and has been led by the reclusive Joseph Kony, a former witch doctor and self-professed spirit medium. Through the large-scale abduction and manipulation of children, Kony transformed his army into an efficient killing machine that has murdered nearly 100,000 and displaced two million people. Kony utilised the society's pervasive belief in witchcraft to instil cult-like convictions in his fighters. This insightful analysis delves into the war's foundations and argues that, much like Rwanda's genocide, international intervention is needed to stop Africa's virulent cycle of violence.

Peter Eichstaedt is the Africa editor for the Institute of War and Peace Reporting in The Hague. He is a veteran journalist who has reported from locations worldwide, including Slovenia, Moldova, Afghanistan, Albania, Armenia, and Uganda, and a former senior editor for Uganda Radio Network. He is the author of If You Poison Us: Uranium and Native Americans.