The Ugandan military says it  had captured a senior rebel from the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) who is accused of leading a massacre of 250 civilians more than 14 years ago.

Okot Atiak was apparently detained last month during a campaign against the LRA guerrillas by Ugandan forces in southeast Central African Republic (CAR). Uganda's army spokesman said he was providing intelligence to troops in the field.

Atiak is not one of three top LRA commanders wanted for war crimes by prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, but he has held several senior positions in one of Africa's most brutal rebel movements.

He is accused of leading the fighters who slaughtered 250 civilians at Atiak village in northern Uganda's Gulu District in April 1995. The attack was seen as an LRA reprisal against fellow ethnic Acholis who failed to support their rebellion.

The militaries of Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have been fighting the LRA in remote south Sudan, northeastern DRC and southern CAR since two years of peace talks collapsed last year.

The negotiations stalled amid mutual mistrust after Joseph Kony, the rebels' elusive leader, refused to sign a final peace agreement that the Ugandan government said would have given him and his top deputies immunity from ICC prosecution.

More than two decades of rebellion by the LRA have killed tens of thousands of civilians and a large swathe of central Africa has been destabilised by marauding LRA guerrillas who are notorious for abducting children.

(*) Photo by Tom on Picasa