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| Invisible Children | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Jason Russell Bobby Bailey Laren Poole |
| Distributed by | Invisible Children, Inc. |
Release date |
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Running time | 55 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
Invisible Children is a 2006 American documentary film that depicts the human rights abuses by the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda. [1]
In the spring of 2003, Jason Russell, Bobby Bailey, and Laren Poole traveled to Africa to document the War in Darfur. Instead, they changed their focus to the conflict in northern Uganda, Africa's second longest-running conflict after the Eritrean War of Independence. The documentary depicts the abduction of children who are used as child soldiers by Joseph Kony and his Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). This film centers around a group of Ugandan children who walk miles every night to places of refuge in order to avoid abduction by the LRA.
The film was first screened on June 22, 2004, at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice at the University of San Diego. [2]
Since then, Invisible Children, Inc. has hosted more than 10,000 screenings at colleges, high schools, churches, concerts and other venues. As of June 2009, it is estimated that more than 5 million people have seen Invisible Children: The Rough Cut. [3]
The story of children depicted in the film was the basis for a grassroots movement mobilizing thousands of American teens into action to raise money to rebuild war-torn schools in northern Uganda and provide scholarships to African youth. [4]
In 2005, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, Invisible Children, Inc., was created, giving individuals a way to respond to the situation in Uganda. [5] An employee of the organization, Nate Henn, was killed in the July 2010 Kampala attacks. [6]
The film is roughly 55 minutes long, and the DVD includes a shorter 35-minute version for different screening options. The DVD also includes special features; deleted scenes, extras, filmmaker commentary, update on the war, and trailers from Invisible Children, Inc. [1]
The Lord's Resistance Army insurgency is an ongoing guerrilla campaign waged by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) insurgent group since 1987. Currently, there is low-level LRA activity in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Central African Republic. The movement is led by Joseph Kony, who proclaims himself the "spokesperson" of God and a spirit medium. It aims to overthrow Yoweri Museveni's Ugandan government and establish a theocratic state based on a version of the Ten Commandments and Acholi tradition.
Joseph Rao Kony is a Ugandan militant who founded the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), designated as a terrorist group by the United Nations Peacekeepers, the European Union and various other governments.
The start of the period 1994 to 2002 of the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency in northern Uganda saw the conflict intensifying due to Sudanese support to the rebels. There was a peak of bloodshed in the mid-1990s and then a gradual subsiding of the conflict. Violence was renewed beginning with the offensive by the Uganda People's Defence Force in 2002.
The period from 2000 to 2006 of the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency in northern Uganda begins with the assault of the Uganda People's Defence Force (UPDF) upon LRA strongholds in South Sudan. This in turn led to a series of retaliatory attacks by the Lord's Resistance Army of an intensity not seen to since the mid-1990s. International awareness of the conflict gradually grew and in September 2005, the International Criminal Court issues warrants for the arrest of senior LRA commanders, including Joseph Kony.
Vincent Otti (c. 1946 – 2 October 2007) was a Ugandan rebel who served as deputy-leader of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a rebel guerrilla army operating mainly in northern Uganda and southern Sudan. He was one of the five persons for whom the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued its first arrest warrants on 8 July 2005. Rumours of his death began to circulate in October 2007 but were not confirmed until January 2008.
Okot Odhiambo was a senior leader of the Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan rebel group which operates from Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Odhiambo was one of five people for whom the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued its first ever arrest warrants in 2005, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity. In 2009, he announced his intention to defect from the LRA and return to Uganda if the government would agree not to surrender him to the ICC.
Dominic Ongwen is a Ugandan former child soldier and former commander of one of the brigades of the Ugandan guerrilla group Lord's Resistance Army (LRA).
The Juba talks were a series of negotiations between the government of Uganda and the Lord's Resistance Army rebel group over the terms of a ceasefire and possible peace agreement. The talks, held in Juba, the capital of autonomous Southern Sudan, began in July 2006 and were mediated by Riek Machar, the Vice President of Southern Sudan. The talks, which had resulted in a ceasefire by September 2006, were described as the best chance ever for a negotiated settlement to the 20-year-old war. However, LRA leader Joseph Kony refused to sign the peace agreement in April 2008. Two months later, the LRA carried out an attack on a Southern Sudanese town, prompting the Government of Southern Sudan to officially withdraw from their mediation role.
The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), also known as the Lord's Resistance Movement, is a rebel group and heterodox Christian group which operates in northern Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Originally known as the United Holy Salvation Army and Uganda Christian Army/Movement, its stated goals include establishment of multi-party democracy, ruling Uganda according to the Ten Commandments, and Acholi nationalism.
Sam Childers, also known as the Machine Gun Preacher, is an American motorcyclist, author, and humanitarian. A former member of the Outlaws Motorcycle Club, Childers became well known after Dateline NBC's story about him and his interactions with Joseph Kony in 2005 and now dedicates his life and resources to rescue children in the war zone of South Sudan. Childers and his wife Lynn founded and operate Angels of East Africa, the Children's Village Orphanage in Nimule, South Sudan, where they currently have around 185 children in their care. Childers also has orphanages and homes in Uganda and Ethiopia with another 160 children in his organisation's care.
Children of War is a 2009 documentary film directed by Bryan Single. Filmed in northern Uganda over a period of three years, the story follows the journey of a group of former child soldiers as they undergo a process of trauma therapy and emotional healing while in a rehabilitation center.
Invisible Children, Inc., founded in 2004, is an organization to increase awareness of the activities of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in Central Africa, and its leader, Joseph Kony. Specifically, the group seeks to put an end to the practices of the LRA, which include abductions and abuse of children, and forcing them to serve as soldiers. To this end, Invisible Children urges the United States government to take military action in the central region of Africa. Invisible Children also operates as a charitable organization, soliciting donations and selling merchandise to raise money for its cause. The organization promotes its cause by dispensing films on the internet and presenting in high schools and colleges around the United States.
The International Criminal Court investigation in Uganda or the situation in Uganda is an ongoing investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) into the Lord's Resistance Army insurgency which has been taking place in northern Uganda and neighbouring regions since 1987. The Lord's Resistance Army is a Christian-based group led by Joseph Kony that is accused of numerous human rights violations including massacres, the abduction of civilians, the use of child soldiers, sexual enslavement, torture, and pillaging. After the government of Uganda referred the matter to the ICC in December 2003, warrants of arrest were issued in 2005 for Joseph Kony, Raska Lukwiya, Okot Odhiambo, Dominic Ongwen, and Vincent Otti, who became the first people to be indicted by the Court.
Kony 2012 is a 2012 American short documentary film produced by Invisible Children, Inc. The film's purpose was to make Ugandan cult leader, war criminal, and ICC fugitive Joseph Kony globally known so as to have him arrested by the end of 2012. The film was released on March 5, 2012, and spread virally, and the campaign was initially supported by various celebrities.
Jason Russell is an American film and theater director, choreographer, and activist who co-founded Invisible Children, Inc. He is the director of Kony 2012, a short documentary film that went viral in the beginning of March 2012. In the first two weeks it gained more than 83 million views on YouTube and became the subject of media scrutiny and criticism. Its subject is the Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony, his alleged war crimes, and the movement to bring him to the International Criminal Court.
StGiNU is an advocacy group formed in the beginning of 2005 by Ugandans living in the United Kingdom. At that time, the situation in the concentration camps in Northern Uganda was claiming lives more than cross fire casualties. In the same year 2005, the Ugandan World Health Organization reported that there were 5000 excess deaths per week due to camp conditions alone.
Grace Akallo is a Ugandan woman who was abducted in 1996 to be used as a child soldier in the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a rebel military group led by Joseph Kony. At the time of her abduction, Akallo was 15 years old and attending St. Mary's College, a Catholic boarding school in Aboke, Uganda. She remained in the LRA for seven months before escaping. After escaping the army, Akallo returned to St. Mary's College to finish her high school education. She began her college education at the Uganda Christian University, but finished her undergraduate degree at Gordon College after receiving a scholarship. Akallo then went on to receive her master's degree from Clark University/ Upon her escape from the LRA, Akallo began working as an advocate for peace and for the rights of African women and children. She has been using both her experiences as a child soldier and the information she has gained in her higher education to advocate against violence and the use of child soldiers, as well as to help counsel other escaped child soldiers like herself.
The Regional Cooperation Initiative for the elimination of the LRA (RCI-LRA) with its military arm, the African Union Regional Task Force was a multi-national operation to counter the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). On 22 November 2011 the AU Peace and Security Council authorized the RCI-LRA with the mandate to "strengthen the operational capabilities of the countries affected by the atrocities of the LRA, create an environment conducive to the stabilization of the affected areas, free of LRA atrocities, and facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid to affected areas." The United Nations provided logistical support, the European Union and African Union contributed additional funding, and the United States provided non-combat military and strategic support.
The Acholi people are a Nilotic ethnic group of Luo peoples, found in Magwi County in South Sudan and Northern Uganda, including the districts of Agago, Amuru, Gulu, Kitgum, Nwoya, Lamwo, Pader and Omoro District. Approximately 2.1 million Acholi were counted in the Uganda census of 2014, and 45,000 more were living in South Sudan in 2000.
Child soldiers in Uganda are members of the Lord's Resistance Army, a rebel group that has been abducting young people since 1987 to fill out their ranks. Children and youth are usually abducted from their homes, often with one or more others, and in characteristically violent ways. New abductees are subjected to an intense period of integration and homogenization. Once indoctrinated, recruits are retained by threats of violence, cultivation of an intense in-group identity, and a belief in spiritual monitoring and punishment.
