causing chaos in the north of the country.

(Another radio newscast) The LRA says it wants to rule Uganda by the Christian 10 Commandments but

it seems to have forgotten the one that says "thou shalt not kill."

The school was like a burial ground.

The clothing and books and properties of the girls were littered everywhere

(Radio newscast) Last May, 14 villagers were abducted there and marched into the bush. The LRA is notorious for capturing and torturing...

My daughter, they gang-raped her and after that terrible ordeal she came back and she committed suicide.

(Radio newscast) 865 women, men and children were reportedly beaten to death by the rebels

It was hell. The situation was hell.

To see these innocent, you know, children who had not done anything wrong but they're suffering like this.

It really touched me, it moved me.

(Radio newscast) Thousands of children have been abducted by LRA rebels.

They are taken into the bush to serve as soldiers and sex slaves

My daughter ... was abducted in 1996 by the Lord's Resistance Army...

a rebels group that used to operate in northern Uganda.

She was taken from her boarding school and had to stay in rebel captivity from '96 to 2004

When my daughter was taken, I was so angry, I was so bitter.

And I was not alone because so many girls were taken from the same school.

And when we formed a concerned parents association...

the group of parents realizing the need to work together, to cry together, to pray together and to advocate together

we realized our voices would go very far, would be loud and would be heard by many more people.

Nobody could protect these children.

Their parents couldn't protect them, the community couldn't protect them, the government couldn't protect them.

This is where the kids used to sleep, just on the ground. Some of them did not have even a blanket.

We first walked like the children who are walking. I started walking from here up to the town.

We don't need to mobilize anybody. Let's go ahead and sleep on the street with our children.

Oh, it was something the children could not believe.

I know the first night the rebels came very close, we could hear the gunshots in the the senior quarter north of Gulu Town.

The children were watching at us, whether we were going to get up.

We did not move an inch, they remained quiet.

it was rough but for the sake of the children and their dignity...

we felt we should do something about their plight.

Forgiveness is actually embedded in our culture.

it is cherished.

it is considered to be a means of continuous, continuous co-existence.

We had to go back and forgive those who had sinned against us, who had caused us pain.

In this region, in over 20 years of insurgency, where the abducted know the abductor,

The tortured know very well who tortured them in the bush

You'd expect almost the whole clan turning against one another.

In every village there's an LRA officer or somebody senior in the LRA.

He's back in the community and people are living with them.

This indicates to me that there is real forgiveness.

Forgiveness is a must, it's a must for us if we want to heal our society.

But if we don't forgive, there's no future.

No future without forgiveness.

(singing)