MPI | Research

HOT SPOTS
By Erin Patrick
In this column, MPI Associate Policy Analyst Erin Patrick examines international crises and humanitarian efforts to assist and protect refugees and internally displaced people. Politically and socially complex, these situations require immediate attention, and usually, action, but they often present political and geographical obstacles that can hamper the effectiveness of aid efforts. This monthly series of articles is designed to stimulate discussion on still-unfolding situations and raise important policy questions for the international community.

The provinces most affected by the conflict are Gulu, Kitgum and Pader.Please click to enlarge map.
Source: United Nations Department of Public Information.

Background
The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) is a mysterious, violent insurgency created eighteen years ago by a man who claims god-like powers, Joseph Kony. As a movement, the LRA's founding is very loosely rooted in the ongoing power struggle between Northern and Southern Uganda, a tension fomented by colonial policy. However, the tactics of the LRA defy its occasional proclamation that it is fighting for the independence of the Acholi people (the largest ethnic group in Northern Uganda). Since mid-2002 alone, the LRA has abducted an estimated 12,000 children, which have then been subjected to or forced to witness -- or commit -- atrocities that compel them to remain with the LRA as fighters, porters or "wives".

The LRA's only known backer was the Sudanese government, which by most accounts gave them arms and allowed them a base in southern Sudan. Sudan's involvement with the LRA was thought to be a means of getting back at the Ugandan government for its alleged support of the Sudan People's Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M), the largest group fighting the Sudanese government in the south. However, the Sudanese government claimed it ceased its support of the LRA after the LRA was designated a terrorist organization by the US Department of State in 2001. Many in the international community have questioned to what extent that support has truly ended. However, since early 2002, the Sudanese government has allowed limited Ugandan military operations on its soil, aimed at attacking LRA bases. The most prominent of these operations so far was called Operation Iron Fist, begun in March 2002.

Though Operation Iron Fist may have succeeded in driving the LRA out of southern Sudan, it has also intensified the conflict. The LRA is by all indications now based in the forests of Northern Uganda, and has exponentially increased its attacks and the abduction of children. Whereas in April 2002, there were an estimated 450,000 displaced people in Northern Uganda, as of mid-2004 this number has increased to an estimated 1.5 million, making the tiny region of Northern Uganda home to the world's third-largest population of internally displaced people (behind only Sudan and Colombia).

One of the most visible results of the increased intensity of the conflict has been the phenomenon of "night commuting"—the nightly migration of 50,000 or more children and teenagers from their villages and camps to larger towns where they feel less vulnerable to abduction by the LRA. Though they may be more protected from abduction, however, the nightly commute makes these children, especially girls, vulnerable to other kinds of exploitation and attack.

"Unlike Any Other, It Is A War on Children": Victims of the Conflict in Northern Uganda

August 17, 2004

The context:

Ninety percent of the population of Northern Uganda—upwards of 1.5 million people, by most estimates—is displaced. Of these, an estimated 50,000 people, mostly children and teenagers, flee their villages and camps every night to avoid being abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). The "night commuters," as they're called, return to their parents in the morning, only to repeat the cycle—every night—as darkness falls.

Numbers are thrown around so often in refugee and humanitarian emergencies that it's easy to lose sight of what they really mean. I'll use MPI's home base of Washington, DC to put it in context: the displacement of 1.5 million Northern Ugandans is equivalent to more than two times the entire population of DC suddenly being forced to flee their homes and take makeshift refuge elsewhere, dependent on handouts and the kindness of strangers for their survival. The admittedly low estimate of 50,000 night commuters is equivalent to just over half of the entire under-18 population of the District, abandoning their homes and parents every night to sleep in the open around schools and hospitals sometimes more than five miles away.

The precarious situation of children in Northern Uganda:

The situation in Northern Uganda is horrifying even for those used to reading about or dealing with displacement crises. That horror exists on at least two levels. First of all, the prospects for an end to the conflict that is at the root of the mass displacement are, at least in the short term, bleak. Few analysts have been able to find a motive or goal behind the actions of the LRA beyond merely self-preservation and aggrandizement, particularly on the part of LRA leader Joseph Kony. Further, neither Kony nor the rest of the LRA leadership is well understood, and it is therefore unclear what could drive them to the negotiating table, let alone cause them to observe a ceasefire or compromise for the sake of peace. The LRA's use of abducted children as frontline combatants not only makes military "victories" by the Ugandan army ring hollow, to say the least, but protects LRA leadership even through major army offensives. The recent intensification of fighting has therefore resulted both in increased abductions and the death of more children.

Secondly, the Ugandan government has pursued a policy of forcing wide swathes of the civilian population of Northern Uganda into camps where, in theory at least, they can be better protected against the LRA. In reality, however, the camps have been less than adequately defended, and in fact have become targets for the LRA, who attack at night, abduct children and loot food and possessions. Recently the Ugandan government has begun inviting civilians to form so-called "Local Defense Units" (LDUs)—basically small paramilitaries—within the camps. The effectiveness of the LDUs has been questioned by many observers, however, as they are armed, yet typically poorly trained—a dangerous combination in any case, let alone one of widespread misery, poverty and forced displacement. Human Rights Watch and others have raised concerns that underage boys have been recruited into LDUs.

Given the lack of security in the camps, it is not surprising that recent reports by the Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children have found that significant numbers (given the transient nature of night commuters, precise statistics are hard to come by) of night commuters are in fact fleeing camps, not just outlying hamlets. This fact in itself is extremely troubling. Forced displacement of civilians by governments is always controversial, but in a situation of extreme and pervasive insecurity, temporarily and as a protection tactic of last resort, it could be allowed by the Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement (particularly Principles 6 and 7). However, the mere fact that children are fleeing abduction from the camps and seeking "shelter" in the open in towns far from their families is clear evidence that protection is sorely lacking in the camps. Having forced civilians to leave their homes, belongings and source of livelihood to "wait out" the conflict in camps, it is clearly the responsibility of the Ugandan government to ensure the protection of civilians in those camps.

The better of two bad choices?

Things aren't necessarily that much safer for the night commuters than for those who remain behind. Leaving their families each and every night to walk, often miles, each way, they frequently end up sleeping on the ground in the open next to hospitals, schools or government buildings, sharing blankets if they have them and without protection from rain or the elements. In some towns, most notably Gulu, there are a limited number of organized shelters where the children are registered and, at least to some extent, looked after by adults. In most other towns, however, there is neither organization nor any kind of protection and adult supervision.

The combination of pervasive insecurity, poverty and lack of protection has proven extremely problematic for the night commuters, particularly girls. The Women's Commission's recent field research in Northern Uganda found widespread incidence of sexual harassment, abuse and assault of girls by men who wait for them to pass by on their way to the towns each night, as well as by other night commuters. The Women's Commission also found that girls will frequently engage in sex with men in exchange for food, money or other items—a clear indication of the dire situation of many of the girls and their families. Girls are in particularly precarious positions since they are often required by their families to remain at home until late in order to finish their chores, forcing them to make the trip into towns after darkness has already fallen, when they are more vulnerable to predators.

In effect, then, night commuters are trading one bad choice for another: either they stay in camps and villages with their families and risk being abducted by the LRA, or they flee every night and risk being attacked on the way. This is a choice that clearly no one would want or should have to make. Now imagine having to make that choice at age 12.

Note: the title of this month's Hot Spot is taken from a statement by Carol Bellamy, Executive Director of UNICEF, following her visit to Northern Uganda in July 2004.

Previous Columns

The World's Worst Humanitarian Crisis Continues: Ethnic Cleansing and Forced Displacement in Darfur
July 14, 2004

Forced Return to Chechnya
June 1, 2004

"The World's Worst Humanitarian Crisis":
Ethnic Cleansing and Forced Displacement in Darfur
May 5, 2004