6,000 homeless as fires destroy huts in northern IDP camps

At least 6,000 people were left homeless after fires broke out in several camps for internally displaced persons (IDPs), an official from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said. The fires were still burning on Monday afternoon, he added. "About 800 huts were burnt over the weekend at Parabongo camp and more were still burning on Monday afternoon," Andrew Timpson, OCHA head of office in Gulu, 380 km north of the capital, Kampala, told IRIN. "Other fires ripped through Cope camp where over 400 huts were destroyed, [along with] Opit and Bobi camps." Timpson said the current hot and windy weather in the war-affected region was to blame for the spread of the fires. Some relief food that was due to be distributed to camp residents by relief agencies was also destroyed. Parabongo is 40 km north of Gulu, while Cope is 15 km north of the town. Opit camp is 22 km east of Gulu and Bobi 26 km south. "At Opit, an electric pole fell on Monday and caused some sparks that started the fire which easily spread through a big chunk of the camp," Timpson added. "We are yet to know the extent of the damage." According to Timpson, relief agencies and NGOs, including Caritas, the Norwegian Refugee Council and the International Committee of the Red Cross, along with the Uganda Red Cross, were in the area to assess the situation and support the affected families. In January, three people were killed and 30,000 left homeless following another wave of fires that struck a number of IDP camps in the region. The most devastating fire hit Acet IDP camp, 44 km east of Gulu. An estimated 4,050 grass-thatched huts were burnt down, destroying all property and food stored in them. According to relief workers, other fires were reported in Keyo and Cope camps in Gulu, where 200 and 50 huts were destroyed, respectively. Another fire destroyed 1,548 huts in neighbouring Lira District The Ugandan minister of state for disaster preparedness, Aporu Amongin, told IRIN at the time that there were plans to prevent fires from recurring in the camps. "The camps mushroomed haphazardly and they were not planned," the minister said. "We want, during reconstruction of the huts, to provide for firebreaks so that the problem is not recurrent. We will make sure that the fireplaces are not so close to the huts." In June 2004, at least 6,000 IDPs were again left homeless after a fire gutted parts of the sprawling Pabbo camp in northern Uganda, destroying hundreds of grass-thatched huts where they had been living. The camps are home to thousands of people displaced by the 18-year-old conflict between the Ugandan government and the rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). More than 1.6 million people have been forced out of their homes by the strife. The LRA has been at war with the Uganda government since 1988. Notorious for their brutality, the rebels have often raided villages and IDP camps to kidnap children living there, either to force them to fight amongst its ranks, or into sexual slavery. Efforts to end the rebellion through peaceful means have thus far met with little success.