The Movement for Reform Judaism

The group packed all the shoppers' bags and handed out information sheets throughout the day. This generated generous donations totalling over £525. The group is planning another ‘bag pack' to try to increase donations for grass-roots projects in Northern Uganda.

Grace Bradley, the event organiser, said: "the group worked together and produced unthinkably great results, exceeding everyone's expectations".

The RSY-Netzer Hadracha Course is a two year leadership training programme for 15 and 16 year olds which aims to inspire young people and develop their leadership skills. At the end of March, 35 participants on the programme graduated at the final residential weekend held in Harrogate. During the programme, participants are encouraged to get involved in grass roots ‘Tikkun olam' initiatives; and the Uganda Social Action Group grew from one of these initiatives.

Gulu Walk is an organisation named after thousands of children who commute from their rural villages in the Gulu district to the town, every night to avoid being abducted by LRA (Lords Resistance Army) soldiers. Money raised is used in grass-roots projects to educate the night commuters about sexual health due to the spread of HIV among the population. Money is also used to improve sanitation and water supplies in displaced people's camps, to name a few projects.

As we speak, the precarious Juba Talks are underway in Southern Sudan, aiming to create a peaceful settlement after a twenty year civil war in Northern Uganda.

Northern Uganda has been utterly ravaged by this was; the LRA (Lords Resistance Army) have abducted over 30,000 children; many have been tortured, murdered, forced to murder and raped. 90% of the population (almost 2 million people) are internally displaced, living in camps with little food and sanitation.

Donations can be continually be made and anyone interested can contact donations@save-uganda.co.uk for more information.

For more information please contact:

Ben Abram

Team Leader

The Uganda Social Action Group 

Email: ben@save-uganda.co.uk
Website: http://www.save-uganda.co.uk/

Notes for Editors

The worst place in the world to be a child

The United Nations recently released a shocking report highlighting the wide-spread abuse of children, and this walk seeks to raise awareness of the abuse suffered by children in northern Uganda during this forgotten 20 year war.  In 20 years 20,000 children have been abducted.  Despite ongoing and welcome peace talks in the region, thousands of children are still suffering the consequences of becoming child soldiers, being raped, being mutilated and being displaced and this walk seeks to tell their story.

Former United Nations Under Secretary General Olara Otunnu has said "northern Uganda is the worst place in the world to be a child"

We urge our government to offer any assistance possible to move towards peace and reconciliation in northern Uganda, and ask them to state clearly that it is unacceptable for this situation to continue.

A brief overview of the LRA conflict in Uganda

The war in northern Uganda has raged now for 21 years, making it Africa's longest running conflict and as described by one UN official: "the world's worst neglected humanitarian crisis." The war has led to the displacement of 1.7 million people - over 80% of the region - who now live in camps of the most squalid conditions. According to recent reports, 1,000 people die each week as a result of the poor conditions in these camps. The war is also known for the brutal abduction and use of child soldiers. The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) has filled its ranks by abducting over 30,000 children. Many of the luckier children who escape abduction are forced to "night commute" each night to sleep under verandas in towns to avoid kidnapping. Tens of thousands of people have been maimed or killed over the course of the conflict.

The situation in northern Uganda is a complex conflict that has been misunderstood by various actors, leading to inadequate and ineffective policy prescriptions. The war is essentially two conflicts in one: first the fighting of the LRA, which is waging war against the Ugandan government and terror against civilian population in the north, and second, the real grievances of Ugandans in the north against the existing government.

The war arose out of a divisive political climate, which was embedded by British 'divide and rule' colonialism and then perpetuated by post-colonial Ugandan politics. This climate created a politicized North-South divide in Uganda, which, mixed with the normalization of political rebellion, created a swamp for insurgency. When the current president, Youweri Museveni and his National Resistance Movement took power by coup in 1986, they alienated northerners, creating perceptual and actual incentives for rebellion.

Since 1986, the insurgency within northern Uganda has undergone four stages, beginning with a more popular rebellion of former army officials and evolving into to the current pseudo-spiritual warlordism of the LRA. To date, the LRA consists predominantly of abducted children brainwashed, brutalized and forced to kill viciously as child soldiers. Alienated from the Acholi, the LRA wages terror on the civilian population as a means to maintain attention and challenge the government.

After attempted peace talks facilitated by Betty Bigombe collapsed in 1994, the conflict was morphed into a proxy war that cannot be understood separate from the geopolitics of the Great Lakes Region. In 1994, the Sudanese government began to provide military assistance and support the LRA, while the Ugandan government provided military assistance to the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), an insurgency in southern Sudan. The West, particularly the United States, saw this as the battlefront of the war against the spread of Islamic fundamentalism in sub-Saharan Africa and provided significant amounts of aid to the SPLA through Uganda. New elements of a war economy and arms trafficking made peace more elusive.

Following September 11, 2001, the United States has increased its strategic alliance with President Museveni and his NRM regime in Uganda. The U.S. quickly declared the LRA a terrorist group and increased military aid to the Ugandan government. This relationship only further solidified the insistence of Museveni on a military approach to end the war. Unfortunately, the "military solution" has exacerbated northern grievances and proven ineffective over the years. According to almost all analysts of the conflict, serious facilitated negotiations with trust-building mechanisms are the key to peace. However, the obstinacy and inconsistency of Museveni, coupled with the incoherency of the LRA, has made such talks difficult.

In the summer of 2006, the newly-formed semi-autonomous Government of South Sudan agreed to host and mediate peace talks between the warring parties. The involvement of such a strategic mediator coupled with new openness by the parties to negotiations led many to call this the "best opportunity in over a decade for peace in northern Uganda." In August, the parties agreed to a Cessation of Hostilities (CoH) that led to relative calm in northern Uganda, allowing some IDPs to return home. However, the talks have since stumbled due to the rigid involvement of the International Criminal Court (ICC), a weak CoH Monitoring Team and divisions within the LRA networks. The international community, especially the U.S. Government, has remained largely silent and missed opportunities to strengthen the peace process. As this neglect continues, the people of northern Uganda remain condemned to lives of despair and displacement.

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