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Agencies see ‘massive tragedy’ in Uganda

02 November 2006

CHRISTIAN relief and aid agencies voiced renewed concern this week about the 18-year-old civil war in Northern Uganda, where the number of people displaced by the fighting has reached more than one million.

The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), which has been fighting the government since 1986, last year extended its activities, attacking the Teso and Lango areas, as well the Acholi sub-region, where it is based. The LRA is accused of abducting and torturing children, using child soldiers, and other human-rights abuses.

At least 50,000 people, mainly women and young teenagers, flee their homes each night for the relative safety of town centres. “Girls and women are forced to choose between their fear of LRA attacks at home and their fear of rape during their nightly flight into town,” said Matthew Emry, project manager for the Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children.

Christian Aid, Tearfund and the Church Mission Society (CMS) are all working with partners in the region to help bring peace. The Acholi Religious Leaders’ Peace Initiative, a Christian Aid partner, is among those trying to initiate dialogue to end the war. Last week, it criticised the Ugandan government’s decision to offer a short-term amnesty for rebels, but not for senior guerrilla leaders.

CMS said it had serious concerns about the “shocking complacency” in Northern Uganda. A senior army commander said last week that he would not invite the United Nations peacekeepers into the country because they could protect themselves. The Commander said he had the “medicine” to end the 18-year war by mobilising local militias.

Concern for children
A spokesman for Tearfund, Ian Wallace, said: “We are particularly concerned about the plight of children. They are affected more severely than in other conflicts because they are being targeted for kidnapping and used as soldiers.” He estimated that 20,000 children had been abducted by the LRA in the past five years.

Last month, the Revd Laurence Pusey, a Baptist chaplain at Leeds Metropolitan University, returned from the diocese of Lango in northern Uganda. He had stayed with the diocesan Bishop, the Rt Revd John Odurkami, who is guarded by an army unit with two tanks because of his outspoken views about the rebels. Speaking this week, Mr Pusey said the rebels were using “guerrilla tactics and witchcraft, and seem to have declared war on the rural population in this heart-breaking and pointless violence”. He was concerned that if people could not return to their farms to get their crops in the ground by February, the area would run out of food.

David Luwum, nephew of Janani Luwum, the Anglican Archbishop of Uganda murdered by Idi Amin in 1977, has visited Uganda for the first time in 15 years. Mr Luwum spoke of “a tragedy of massive proportions”, and called for greater international involvement.

Links:
www.tearfund.org
www.christianaid.co.uk
www.cms-uk.org

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