Tall Grass

Tall Grass: Stories of Suffering and Peace in Northern Uganda is a personal story of a Spanish priest who was working in northern Uganda when a bizarre group that called itself The Lord's Resistance Army declared war on the government. Within a few years, the conflict had brought large scale suffering and misery to the region. Father Carlos was so pained by the situation that he decided to embark on a quest to find a solution to the problem. But first he had to undertake a tacit and cautious inquiry into the nature and causes of the misunderstanding between the two sides to the conflict. Next he had to find allies to work with in the search for a solution. Father Carlos worked with Acholi Religious Leaders' Peace Initiative and the Justice and Peace Commission of Gulu Archdiocese. He was part of the efforts of northern Uganda's civil society, a peace movement that included traditional leaders, local politicians, religious leaders, media personalities as well as foreign diplomats, all of who could have some influence on the course of event. However, there were occasions in which the priest found himself in conflict with some of them, for different reasons. But Father Carlos would not listen to any of this because he was living in a theatre of horror in which he watched young children being abducted and being forced to join the rebels and young girls being forced to become rebels' concubines. So tormented was he by the magnitude of the human suffering he saw around him that he experienced psychological traumas that affected him deeply and required professional help. This book is Carlos' single minded determination to mobilise assistance for the abducted children and their families as well as for the hundreds of peasants who were driven into displaced people's camps by the war.