Why is the GfbV working for peace in the north of Uganda?

Göttingen
Children and women are those hardest hit by the civil war, which has been raging in the North of Uganda for 19 years. United Nations sources show that some 1000 people die there every week as a result of civil war, human rights violations and the lack of humanitarian care. The UN sees the situation in the north of Uganda as one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes in the world. Relief workers of international organisations say that for children it is „hell on earth”. Since ethnic conflicts lie at the root of the civil war and massive violations of human rights are taking place, we see it also as our task to work for peace in north Uganda.

Why is there no real protection for the children and the rest of the civilian population?

More than 1.6 million people, some 90 percent of the population in the most important regions of northern Uganda have had at the orders of the authorities to leave their houses and seek safety in refugee camps. Most of the refugees are women and children. But they are not safe in the camps either. So fighters of the „Lord’s Resistance Army” (LRA) constantly attack the camps looking for material and to forcibly recruit children for their terror movement. Protection by soldiers is often inadequate. Indeed they themselves often commit violations of human rights against those for whose safety they are responsible. So soldiers or militia working together with government forces arbitrarily arrest and torture civilians, rape women and steal aid material. The people in the camps lack the most fundamental care such as aid materials and water, and there are not enough schools or clinics.

Why do tens of thousands of children seek refuge from violence in the towns every evening?

Even in the villages of north Uganda there is no safety for the children. Since their families cannot provide them with safety more than 40,000 children must walk very long distances to escape from the LRA and to make sure that they are not kidnapped. Only a very few find a place to sleep at a reception centre, while most of them spend the nights on the streets, in bus stations and parks. The following morning they return to their own villages.

This daily mass flight of tens of thousands of children makes clear how little the fate of the civil population interests the two sides in the civil war. Only a rapid peace can end the tragedy of the children in northern Uganda.

How can we give the most effective help to the children of north Uganda?

Many relief organisations are concerned to alleviate the suffering of the children with humanitarian aid and better care. The European Union also provides financial aid for these measures. This humanitarian aid is certainly important, however it can only alleviate, but not put an end to, the suffering of the children. Only peace and the beginning of a credible dialogue on the causes of the tensions between the north and the south of the country can bring a permanent close to the humanitarian tragedy in the multiethnic state.

The children receive a great deal of support from the churches. The archbishop of Gulu, John Adama, even spent the night with them on the street in order to draw attention to their suffering. The Christian churches and also Moslem preachers are constantly warning that only peace can put an end to the humanitarian catastrophe. For years an

interreligious peace initiative has been working hard but in vain for an end to the civil war. A few months ago the bishops went to Europe and begged European governments for aid in the negotiation of a peace treaty. The members of the peace initiative are being harassed and intimidated by the Ugandan authorities. For the government in Kampala has laid its all on the military card. It wants to defeat the LRA by military means at all costs.

Why can the conflict not be solved by military means?

It is true that the government of Uganda declared months ago that the civil war is over and that the LRA is about to be destroyed. Yet for the civilian population the situation became worse in the autumn of 2005. Following attacks of the LRA on workers of relief organisations many international relief organisations have temporarily ceased their operations in north Uganda. The 1.6 million people in the refugee camps are now faced with a further exacerbation of their humanitarian situation, since the quantity of relief goods arriving in the camps is further decreasing and the care from the foreign aid workers has been considerably reduced.

The LRA received military aid from the Sudanese army for a long time. In recent years it has been operating more and more from southern Sudan. But since the end of the civil war in January 2005 it is losing its base there too. In the meantime the Sudanese government has allowed the Ugandan army to pursue the LRA on Sudanese territory. But in spite of this cooperation the Ugandan government has so far not been able to beat them. Sometimes the underground movement retreats into the Congo, sometimes into northeast Uganda.

Some 80 percent of the LRA fighters were press-ganged as child soldiers and trained to kill. Nobody knows how many fighters the LRA still has today. Regardless of recent defeats and a political surround which is unfavourable to them, the LRA is still very flexible and is disturbing the whole region. Even if it were possible to beat them militarily peace would only be secured in the long-run if the Ugandan government were also in a position to remove the results of the revolts in the north. However the government in Kampala does not want to know about the dissatisfaction of the people there.

Why does the civil war also concern Europe?

The causes of the conflict in northern Uganda go back far into the British colonial time. It was the policy of „divide and rule” which laid the basis for later conflicts between the ethnic communities in the north and south of the multi-ethnic state. While the Acholi and other peoples in the north made up most of the army, members of the ethnic communities in the south had more influence in the economy and politics. After independence the governments continued this fatal policy with the result that there was an increase of the tensions between the peoples of the south and the north. The Acholi felt increasingly disadvantaged and rose up in the eighties against the south of Uganda.

Today the government in Kampala is putting the screw on the ethnic nature of the conflict by politically isolating the Acholi and then building up small militia in the small peoples which are supposed to work together with the Ugandan army.

While the LRA did have a certain following at the outset, today it is rejected by the great majority of the Acholi and other neighbouring peoples as a result of its terror policies. But there are not a few leading Ugandan politicians who maintain publicly that all Acholi are supporters of the LRA, thus pouring oil on the flames. When some politicians called for all Acholi above the age of 18 to be killed on account of their supposed sympathies for the LRA, the Acholi reacted with the charge that genocide was to be perpetrated against them. Yet the Ugandan government merely watches on while the tensions between north and south are constantly growing.

Why can the LRA not be stopped by international arrest warrants?

The LRA spreads terror and panic among the civilian population by attacks and murder. It has trained its child soldiers to kill. The kidnapped children must not only plunder, burn and murder „in the name of the Lord”, but they must often serve their commanders as sex-slaves. The confused programme of the LRA, which is oriented on the realisation of the „Ten Commandments”, no longer convinces the people of northern Uganda.

The government in Kampala calls the LRA a terrorist organisation and has meanwhile convinced the US government that the LRA is a terror organisation and that it should be listed as such in the sense of the 11th September 2001. Yet although the LRA commits the worst violations of human rights this categorisation is not justified. For the LRA has no connection with Muslim terrorism. The US government only complied with the wish from Kampala because in the light of terror attacks in neighbouring Kenya and Tansania and the withdrawal plans of Muslim terrorists to Somalia it is interested in the extension of its security partnership with Uganda.

At the behest of the Ugandan government the International Court is also investigating against the LRA. In October 2005 warrants were issued for the arrest of the LRA leader Joseph Kony and four leading LRA officers. While some human rights organisations saw this as an important step in ending the impunity there was also a great deal of criticism in the north of Uganda. For the warrants would lead in the opinion of the former Ugandan minister, Betty Bigombe, to the collapse of the peace process, in which she had for years done her best to play a mediating role. For the 1.6 million refugees and the relatives of the several thousand victims of the civil war peace comes before justice. First of all the enormous suffering of the civilian population must be ended.

The people in the north of the country charge the International Court of Justice with not prosecuting the violations of human rights of the Ugandan army with the same rigour. So the Ugandan government rejects all charges in this direction against those responsible in the Ugandan army and allied militia. For the prosecution of offences not committed by the LRA the Ugandan justice department holds competence. However most soldiers and militiamen go scot-free as the authorities are not interested in the prosecution of their offences.

Why can North Uganda find no peace without international assistance?

Neither the Ugandan army nor the government in Kampala has ans serious interest in peace for North Uganda. The government sets everything on a military solution of the conflict while the LRA, which is being pressed from all sides, is striving to make clear with its terrorist attacks that it has not been defeated militarily. It is only international pressure which will move both conflict parties to take up serious peace talks.

In spite of the enormous extent of the humanitarian catastrophe neither the Security Council of the United Nations nor the European Union have taken any concrete measures for peace in North Uganda. There have of course been statements on how concerned they are about the fate of the civilian population, and indeed humanitarian aid has been provided, but otherwise the majority of the western countries have done precious little to help in North Uganda. Although the call for an international peacekeeping brigade can no longer be overheard this is being totally disregarded in Kampala, in the European capitals and in the USA. Although the war has long been a problem for relations with the neighbouring states Sudan and Congo, Uganda’s government is afraid of an internationalisation of the conflict and rejects fiercely any interference from outside. The international community of states can no longer simply look on while the civilian population is suffering and is not being protected by the Ugandan security forces. It must take concrete measures to ensure that the conflict parties cease hostilities.

A similar situation obtained in the year 2004 in the south of Sudan. There too the two conflict parties – the Sudanese government and the southern Sudanese resistance movement SPLA – showed little interest in a peace settlement. It was only thanks to the pressure from the USA and other states that in January 2005 a peace treaty was finally signed for the south Sudan.

The attitude of the donor countries will be decisive, which for the most part belong to the European Union. For this reason we turn to the Austrian Foreign Minister, Dr Ursula Plassnik, who takes the chair at the Council of European Foreign Ministers between January and July 2006. We appeal to her urgently to begin an EU peace campaign for north Uganda. The main aim should be not only to bring the two conflict parties to negotiations in a neutral place, but also to discuss the causes of the continuing tensions between the peoples in the north and south of Uganda. The EU states should also use their influence in the Security Council to force the United Nations to credible measures for peace in North Uganda.