Northern Exposure

I have been meaning to post an update of the situation in northern Uganda for a while now, for people's information, but am just working so so so hard that I don't get much time for anything else. I'm not sure how much people know, but there was supposed to be a big signing of the Peace Agreement between the Government of Uganda (GoU) and the LRA in April this year in Juba (southern Sudan) that failed - Kony (LRA leader) never showed and it turned out that the LRA negotiator in the mediations had never actually met or spoken with Kony, and was not speaking for him, as he had claimed.

Although there has been no resumption of open conflict in the north following this, small skirmishes have been reported, as have isolated LRA sightings. Additionally, it has had a profound impact upon the IDP (Internally Displaced People - most people in the north fit into this category - IDPs are refugees who have not crossed an international border - they are displaced within their own country - like the Sudanese living in camps in Darfur). People are more fearful - there has been a slow but steady transition of people from the large mother camps to smaller resettlement/return camps which still offer the safety of an army presence, but are closer to original homestead and thus allow some access to their land to farm. These movements are creating a whole new situation on the ground (which is a whole different posting topic!) but people are now reluctant to move from the return camps all the way home, and those that have gone home, or are at the return camps are constantly prepared to flee back to the mother camps. I have noticed slightly more (not much, but a bit) troop movement in the north in the past few months. Another tragic thing is the impact this development has on the psychological recovery of former child soldiers - they are now more fearful with a potential return to conflict - those that have escaped the LRA are at greater danger or reprisal from the rebels.

Anyway - the Secretary General of the UN released a report on Children in Armed Conflict in Uganda - I thought I would post an excerpt here so you can read. Long story short: it aint over yet - all the abducted children are out of reach in Sudan and Congo and they're not being released. We still need your thoughts/hopes/efforts/prayers:


25 June 2008 – Although the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) does not seem to be recruiting children in Uganda, women and children are still present in its ranks, and the rebel group is allegedly enlisting young people from neighbouring countries, according to a United Nations report released today.


The LRA, which has fought a civil war with the Ugandan Government since the mid-1980s, became notorious during the conflict for abducting as many as 25,000 children and using them as fighters and porters. The children were often subject to extreme violence shortly after abduction, with many girls allocated to officers in a form of institutional rape.


“Owing to the apparent absence of LRA from Ugandan territory, there have been no recent cases of recruitment and use of Ugandan children, or other grave violations against children attributable to LRA,” Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon writes in a new report to the Security Council.

“However, children and women are still present in the LRA ranks, and there has been no movement on their release,” he adds.

In addition, he notes there are reports alleging that the group has been recruiting children
from southern Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Central African Republic (CAR).


In one case, three boys from the Sudan and the CAR who escaped from the LRA reported that they had been forced to work for the group as porters. They also reported that girls were present in the ranks, and that they were regularly subjected to gender-based violence, including rape.

On 23 April, authorities in Dungu in eastern DRC reported that 13 people, including four students, were abducted from a primary school following LRA attacks.


“These allegations are being reported while the peace talks between LRA and the Government of Uganda are stalled, notably because of the refusal by the LRA leader, Joseph Kony, to sign the final peace agreement,” Mr. Ban writes.


Last July the Security Council Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict called on the LRA to unconditionally release children used in their ranks, and underlined the absence of any concrete signs in this regard.


The Group also noted the International Criminal Court indictments against five senior members of the LRA – the leader Joseph Kony, and the commanders Vincent Otti, Okot Odhiambo, Dominic Ongwen and Raska Lukwiya – on a number of charges, including the enlistment of children through abduction.

The rebel group has maintained that it had released all children and women abducted or
forcibly conscripted some time ago and that those who remained in the bush were women and children related to LRA members.
Mr. Ban says that this information cannot be independently verified because of the absence of any direct contacts between the UN and the LRA leadership.

The Secretary-General urges the LRA to provide a complete list of names and ages of the women and children remaining in its ranks for verification and to carry out their immediate release.

In addition, he says the UN Task Forces on Monitoring and Reporting in Uganda, the CAR, the DRC and the Sudan, in cooperation with the UN missions in the DRC and Sudan, should develop a strategy to increase monitoring and reporting on cross-border recruitment and use of children by the LRA.