Thousands of Sudanese refugees displaced in the northwest

United Nations agencies have begun an assessment mission in northwestern Uganda following the mass displacement of Sudanese refugees by Ugandan rebels, an official of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) told IRIN on Monday. The UNHCR spokesman for Uganda, Dennis Duncan, said an assessment team comprising UNHCR, World Food Programme and UN Development Programme officials had been sent to the affected districts of Moyo and Adjumani "to figure out where it is safe and where it is not". "There are tens of thousands that have been displaced over the last three months," Duncan said. "The concern is self-reliance strategies breaking down as a result. There is no huge emergency, but it's planting season soon. We are concerned that if they do not plant now, there could be food shortages further down the road." In recent months, small gangs of Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels, in search of food and medicine, have been attacking Sudanese refugee settlements in the area. The attacks have partly resulted from increased pressure on the LRA inside Sudan from the Ugandan army under an agreement authorising the army to pursue the rebels inside Sudan. Many of the rebels have reportedly fled into northwestern Uganda. UN officials said mounting insecurity had forced their agencies working in the northwestern districts to be evacuated to the west bank of the Albert Nile. "We've moved our personnel to Moyo town and they have to come over east again in the daytime to work," Duncan said. However, he added that the rebels had not been killing or kidnapping in the region. "As of yet, there are no deaths, no abductions - apart from short-term abductions to help carry loot. They are not going after the people," he said. The LRA have fought in northern Uganda for 18 years. Led by a reclusive mystic, Joseph Kony, who lives in caves in southern Sudan, they have committed many atrocities against defenceless civilians in the northern and eastern regions. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that 1.5 million people have been displaced by fear of rebel attacks since the war began.