20100717
allafrica

The US government has sent 60 Federal Bureau of Investigations specialists to comb Uganda for forensic leads as two more terrorist suspects were picked in Arua District on Friday.

Speaking in Washington, Assistant Secretary Philip Crowley said: "For Uganda, we saw the arrival of roughly 60 or 63-men FBI team and they are fully engaged in the investigative team in support of Ugandan authorities and they will be there for several days."

The huge expert team is here at the invitation of the government to gather forensic leads into the July 11 bomb explosions in Kampala, Ms Joann Lockard, the public affairs officers at the US Mission in Kampala said.

Uganda is a strong Washington ally, particularly on matters of regional security, and provides the bulk of African Union Peacekeeping (AMISOM) troops in Mogadishu, largely funded by America to fortify President Sheik Sharif Sheikh Ahmed's wobbly Transitional Federal Government.

In a separate background briefing to the media mid this week, a senior Department of State official declared America's solid support to regional allies to tackle terrorism but said Washington had no forewarning al Shabaab would strike in Uganda's capital.

President Museveni has vowed to take the war to the Somali radical militants saying they had made a big mistake by attacking Uganda, although he discredited suggestions the blasts were to avenge UPDF deployment in Mogadishu.

He argued that terrorists, in 1998, bombed the US missions in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania when the two regional neighbours had no force in a foreign country.