LRA actions restrict relief work in northern districts

Civilian deaths resulting from fighting between Ugandan government forces and the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) in the north of the country have increased in recent months, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) in the Ugandan capital, Kampala. Continued fighting was also restricting humanitarian work in Gulu, Kitgum and Pader districts, UNOCHA reported in its humanitarian update for June. Despite amnesty talks between the government and the LRA leadership, which commenced in April, “not much has changed in terms of rebel presence and attacks”, OCHA said. The report added that many people had been prevented from carrying out normal agricultural activities and pockets of rebels in some areas had “continued to cause panic among civilian communities”. “The unending security incidents with additional armed robberies heighten concerns for the safety of the vulnerable civilian population and the humanitarian community working in the area,” according to OCHA. The agency also reported an upward trend in the number of abductees escaping LRA captivity in southern Sudan. So far in 2001, UNICEF, the International Office of Migration (IOM) and the governments of Uganda and Sudan had returned 131 children to their homes, it said. Some of these children had lived their entire lives under LRA control, having been born in LRA camps in southern Sudan. Many of the 212 people to have escaped from the rebels during 2000-2001 had passed through a Sudanese government reception centre in Juba, southern Sudan, established following recent improvements in Ugandan-Sudanese bilateral relations, OCHA said. In April, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson cited figures from the Abducted Children Registration and Information System, a database developed and maintained jointly by UNICEF and Uganda, of 26,365 cases of abduction by the LRA in northern Uganda. About one-third of these involved children under the age of 18, and roughly 20 per cent of the recorded abductees were female, she added. This year alone, if there was no change, hundreds of boys and girls would most probably be abducted by the LRA, according to Robinson. Many of them would ultimately perish in the bush, either as a result of harsh living conditions or at the hands of other captives, she added. Most of the women and girls who had been abducted and retained by the LRA were taken to serve as “wives” for the LRA commanders. Those who did not comply with sexual demands were beaten or killed, UNHCHR stated. It was reported that many babies had been born in the LRA camps, and for those young women who would otherwise try to escape and return to their families, the social stigma of having become pregnant under such circumstances reportedly added to their reluctance and fear to return home. A large proportion of 6,000 missing children were presumed to be dead, it added. The Government of Uganda has said it places particular importance on the signing of the bilateral agreement between Uganda and Sudan, according to which the governments of the two countries committed themselves to relocating, disarming and disbanding the LRA. Ugandan delegate Arthur Gakwandi told the UNHCHR in April that Kampala was ready to fulfil its obligations under the agreement to bring peace to the area, and was also ready to set up an observer mission to monitor the border between Sudan and Uganda and to allay suspicions that Uganda supported rebels - of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) - fighting against the government of Sudan. Umar Siddiq, representing the Sudanese government, said then that Khartoum condemned the abduction of children as “a reprehensible practice” and was making every effort to put an end to it. The Sudanese government had undertaken steps to implement an agreement to end this phenomenon, but borders between the two countries were insecure and, for that reason, Sudan was looking at proposals by Egypt and Libya to deploy observers in the area, he added. The Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers [www.child-soldiers.org/], an umbrella grouping of NGOs campaigning on the issue, reported in June that an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 children had been recruited by various armed groups in Uganda since 1986, and many of those children had been compelled against their will to fight as soldiers.