Ugandan troops will withdraw from eastern DR Congo in two weeks after a joint operation against Islamist insurgents since late last year, land forces Commander Muhoozi Kainerugaba announced on Twitter on Tuesday.

“Operation Shujaa will officially cease in about 2 weeks according to our original agreement. It was supposed to last for 6 months,” tweeted Kainerugaba, adding that “Unless I get further instructions from our Commander in Chief or CDF, I will withdraw all our troops from DRC in 2 weeks.”

Operation Shujaa will officially cease in about 2 weeks according to our original agreement. It was supposed to last for 6 months. Unless I get further instructions from our Commander in Chief or CDF, I will withdraw all our troops from DRC in 2 weeks. pic.twitter.com/n4iE20aEFc

— Muhoozi Kainerugaba (@mkainerugaba) May 17, 2022

President Yoweri Museveni’s government sent hundreds of soldiers into eastern Congo in December to join the Congolese military in an assault on the bases of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).

The ADF began as an uprising in Uganda but has been based in DR Congo since the late 1990s, pledging its allegiance to the Islamic State, and has been accused of killing hundreds of villagers over the past two years.

There was no reason given for the planned Ugandan withdrawal or update on the status of the operation against the ADF.

Uganda’s deployment of at least 1,700 soldiers constituted the largest foreign intervention in Congo in over a decade, apart from a United Nations peacekeeping operation.