UN urges end to Ugandan 'horror'
Friday, 22 October 2004
UN urges end to Ugandan 'horror'
Northern Uganda is suffering the most neglected humanitarian crisis in the world with 20,000 children caught up in a war, the United Nations has warned.
The UN's head of humanitarian affairs, Jan Egeland, urged countries to do more to end what he called a "litany of horrors" stretching back 18 years. The conflict has displaced about 1.6 million people, said Mr Egeland, who briefed the UN Security Council. But he said that peace in neighbouring Sudan might have a positive effect.
- 100,000 deaths
- 20,000 children abducted and used as fighters or sex slaves
- 1.6m people displaced
- 40,000 "night commuters" - people who flee their homes by night to avoid raids
sources: Jan Egeland, news agencies
"There is a peace process in Sudan which can have a positive spillover because the war in Sudan had a negative spillover earlier on the conflict in northern Uganda,\" Mr Egeland told reporters after the briefing.
A rebel militia known as the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has been fighting government forces in the area since 1986, replenishing its ranks with abducted children. The International Criminal Court is investigating alleged war crimes committed by the rebels, thought to have used bases in Sudan.
Their leader, Joseph Kony, says he is fighting for the rights of local people but observers say he has won little support in a war which has seen mass abduction and rape.
Scent of victory
Mr Egeland took heart at the fact that the Security Council had "devoted so much time" to the crisis when he addressed it at a closed hearing on Thursday. However, the UN's emergency relief coordinator stressed that world governments had to pay greater attention, provide more aid and put more pressure on the parties to end the conflict.
"Some 80% of LRA fighters are children and about 90% of the local population have been driven from their homes", he said. "We hope that... we are now seeing a beginning of an end to this endless litany of horrors where children are the fighters and the victims in northern Uganda," he added.
The Ugandan government has reported mounting successes against the rebels in recent months and its ambassador to the UN, Francis Butagira, said the timing of Mr Egeland's appeal for peace was unhelpful. Government forces, he said, were now winning the war against the rebels.
