Lord's Resistance Army rebels on Saturday snubbed Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, who called for the speedy resolution of outstanding issues at faltering peace talks aimed at ending two decades of brutal insurgency, officials said.
Ugandan government officials said the LRA team, led by the movement's spokesman Godfrey Aywo, refused to greet Museveni after he addressed delegates from both sides in the south Sudan capital Juba, the venue of the negotiations.
"After the president addressed the plenary... he left his seat and went where the LRA were seated to shake their hands, but one of them refused and stormed out," Ugandan Deputy Foreign Minister Okello Oryem told AFP.
"Others refused to shake his hand too... but the president told them that the reason he went to Juba was to encourage the peace talks," he added.
Museveni, meeting the rebels for the first-time in his presidency, said he "came to show his support to the talks. He said they should expedite the process because there are spoilers who are bent on frustrating the process," according to the minister.
The peace talks, which began in July, have stalled since producing a truce in August with both sides accusing the other of repeated violations. Rebel demands include restructuring the Ugandan army, compensation for northern Uganda and restoration of the federal government.
The talks are seen by many as the best chance so far to end northern Uganda's brutal 20-year war that has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced two million others, many of whom fled across the border into southern Sudan.
Officials said the rebels demanded an apology from Museveni for his army's alleged atrocities in northern Uganda.
The rebels who refused to greet Museveni are angry over claims made by the Ugandan military that the LRA killed at least 40 people in ambushes in southern Sudan earlier this week.
The attacks, which occurred a few miles from Juba, spread panic through nearby villages and were seen as undermining the peace talks being mediated by the south Sudan's vice president Riek Machar.
The rebels have vehemently denied the allegations and urged truce monitors to open a probe into the killings.
They have also demanded an apology from Ugandan newspapers, including the state-owned New Vision and the independent paper The Monitor, for portraying LRA insurgents as ruthless killers bent on slaying civilians.
Despite the cold shoulder LRA delegates showed Museveni on Saturday, Aywo said both sides planned on meeting "in the coming days" to review the terms of the truce and plug gaps that could lead to further violations.
Last week, after both sides admitted to truce violations, the rebels proposed modifying the agreement so Ugandan soldiers operating in the region would be confined to camps, like themselves, to ensure the pact is respected.
Officials said Museveni, who supported the ex-rebel Sudan People's Liberation MovementArmy (SPLMA) during its war with Khartoum's Islamic regime, addressed the southern Sudan parliament and called for co-operation as well as urging the region to have a string army.
Authorities temporarily closed the town's airport as "a short security precaution" for the arrival of Museveni, who made no comment after he was received by south Sudan president, Salva Kiir.
The conflict has raged since 1988, when the elusive LRA leader Joseph Kony took leadership of a regional rebellion among northern Uganda's ethnic Acholi minority.
Allegedly fighting for a government based on the Biblical Ten Commandments, the rebels are accused of horrendous atrocities for which Kony and four top aides have been charged with war crimes by the International Criminal Court.
Those charges have become a major sticking point in the Juba talks. The rebels demand they be quashed before agreeing to any peace deal, while Kampala refuses to implement an offer of total amnesty until a pact is actually agreed.
The conflict is regularly described by the United Nations and relief agencies as one of the world's worst and most-forgotten humanitarian crises.