WFP resumes food distributions in north

The UN's World Food Programme (WFP) has resumed food distributions in northern Uganda, following measures by the Ugandan government to restore security in the region. Over the past four weeks, the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has intensified attacks in the area, characterised by looting, road ambushes, burning of villages and abduction of civilians. Edward Kallon, WFP's deputy country director for Uganda, told IRIN on Tuesday his agency had resumed food distributions in the region, following the redeployment of the army and the appointment of a presidential envoy to the region. "The president of Uganda sent a special envoy to the north, and the UPDF [Uganda People's Defence Forces] has redeployed. Minimum security has been fulfilled. Our convoys are being escorted," he said. According to the government-owned 'New Vision' daily, Kallon told a press conference in the Ugandan capital Kampala that eight trucks, each carrying 15 tonnes of food, arrived in the northern town of Gulu on Monday. "WFP is now launching an emergency operation to save lives because internally displaced persons are no longer able to access their gardens and are completely dependent on humanitarian aid," Kallon said. WFP will need at least 23,000 mt of food to feed nearly half a million vulnerable people in northern Uganda, most of whom had been cultivating their own food, but had been forced to abandon their gardens by the heightened insecurity in the region, he added. He said that before the attacks began, the communities in northern Uganda were able to produce at least 70 percent of their food requirements, and only received 30 percent in assistance from WFP. "Now they can't even produce the 70 percent we had planned for. They no longer have access to their gardens. We have to mobilise resources," he stressed.