LRA attacks hampering aid effort in southern Sudan - UN

Continued attacks on civilians in southern Sudan by the Ugandan rebel group, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), are making humanitarian access to the region's vulnerable populations increasingly difficult, the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS) said on Wednesday. It said the impaired access was preventing relief agencies from forming a clear picture of the numbers of affected populations and delivering much-needed aid, the UN News Service reported. The LRA, which has waged a 19-year war against the government of Uganda, operates from bases in northern Uganda and southern Sudan, and frequently targets southern Sudanese civilians. The government of Sudan, the southern Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army and the Ugandan army recently launched a joint operation to flush the rebels out of Sudan. UNMIS also said continued extortion and forced conscription of returnees by local militias was of concern to humanitarian agencies operating in Sudan's south, a region emerging from a 21-year war. Humanitarian agencies expect some four million southern Sudanese refugees to return home in the near future. In the three states of western Sudan's troubled Darfur region, UNMIS said armed clashes and banditry had also hampered humanitarian access to populations in need - villagers throughout the region had reported continuous harassment by nomads and militia through looting, banditry and forced payment of "protection taxes". In West Darfur alone, aid to some 170,000 people had been temporarily restricted, while in North Darfur, three separate and serious clashes had been reported over the past six days involving government troops, rebels and militia. Fighting in Darfur began when two main rebel groups - the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and the Justice and Equality Movement - took up arms in February 2003, citing discrimination and oppression of the region by the Sudanese government. The government is accused of unleashing militia, known as the Janjawid, on civilians in an attempt to quash the rebellion. Some 2.9 million people continue to be affected by the conflict, 1.85 million of whom are internally displaced or have fled to neighbouring Chad, according to the UN.