U.S. Committee for Refugees World Refugee Survey 2001 - Uganda

Uganda hosted approximately 230,000 refugees at the end of 2000: some 200,000 from Sudan, nearly 15,000 from Rwanda, about 10,000 from Congo-Kinshasa, 1,000 from Somalia, and several thousand from various other countries.

An estimated 20,000 Ugandans were refugees, including approximately 10,000 in Congo-Kinshasa, some 5,000 in Sudan, and about 5,000 in Kenya.

Approximately 500,000 Ugandans were internally displaced, although some estimates ranged much higher. An estimated 120,000 or more Ugandans became newly uprooted during the year because of violence.

Armed Violence

Armed insurgencies and communal violence continued to destabilize several areas of Uganda during 2000.

In northern Uganda, an insurgent force known as the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) continued to raid towns and displacement camps for the fourteenth year. LRA combatants reportedly killed more than 170 people in Uganda during the year.

In southwestern Uganda, a rebel force known as the Alliance for Democratic Forces (ADF) continued to terrorize the local population for the fifth year. ADF raids reportedly killed 210 civilians in 2000. The ADF, the LRA, and other rebel groups have killed 5,000 to 10,000 persons and abducted about 10,000 others during the past 10 years, according to various estimates. The Ugandan government has long accused the Sudanese government of providing military aid to Uganda's insurgencies.

Rebel combatants largely ignored the Ugandan government's offer of amnesty in mid-1999, prompting a promise in late 2000 by Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni that "we are going to kill all of them." Previous government declarations that the insurgents were on the verge of defeat have proven untrue, however.

In northeastern Uganda, tensions over land use, drought, and cattle-raiding between ethnic Karamojong and their neighbors triggered renewed violence during 2000. Isolated communal clashes also reportedly occurred in eastern Uganda.

Some analysts warned that the Ugandan military's involvement in a war in neighboring Congo-Kinshasa since 1998 had weakened its ability to control violence inside Uganda.

Uprooted Ugandans

Despite Uganda's international reputation for improved stability, an estimated half-million Ugandans remained uprooted from their homes at the end of 2000, including some 120,000 or more who became newly displaced because of fresh violence during the year.

Some aid agencies estimated that the number of internally displaced Ugandans was as high as 600,000 to 700,000, but those numbers were believed to be inflated by poor census figures at displacement sites.

At least 400,000 persons were displaced in the north – primarily in the districts of Gulu and Kitgum – because of attacks by the LRA and the government's controversial counterinsurgency tactic of moving massive numbers of people into so-called "protected villages." Some residents resided in the protected villages voluntarily. Others lived there involuntarily. About half of all residents of Gulu District were uprooted.

As in previous years, LRA combatants often attacked camps and towns housing displaced people. An LRA raid on a displacement camp in March killed 12 persons, wounded 30, and burned 800 homes. Ten people were abducted in an attack on a protected village the same month. Numerous other raids occurred throughout the year. Relief workers said that northern Uganda's recurring violence claimed more lives than did the area's poverty and poor humanitarian conditions.

"The humanitarian context in Uganda has degraded considerably," a UN humanitarian report stated in June. A similar UN assessment in November complained that "the world remained conspicuously silent and seemingly indifferent" to the suffering of Ugandans.

International attention briefly focused on Uganda in late 2000 when an outbreak of ebola virus in the country's northern conflict zone killed some 150 people. One survey estimated that the lethal combination of violence and the HIV/AIDS epidemic had orphaned nearly one of every six children in northern Uganda. Occupants of overcrowded displacement camps and towns suffered malaria, measles, and diarrheal diseases. Humanitarian workers reported that more than half of all young children in the hard-hit Gulu District were under normal weight.

"The displaced are facing a situation of long-term social neglect," resulting in widespread alcoholism, sexual abuse, and low school enrollment, a UN humanitarian report on northern Uganda concluded in October.

In the conflict zone of southwestern Uganda, near the country's border with Congo-Kinshasa, at least 100,000 persons remained internally displaced at year's end. Many lived in about 50 camps near the major town of Bundibugyo, where nearly 80 percent of the area's population were displaced in mid-2000. Sanitation conditions at some camps were abysmal, with dirty drinking water and fewer than one-quarter of the latrines needed for such a large camp population, according to relief agencies. Other displaced families crowded into the homes of friends and relatives.

The displaced population in the southwest was fluid. Some families trickled back to their homes during the second half of the year even while new population displacement occurred elsewhere in the area because of new attacks by ADF insurgents.

The dangers in northern and southwestern regions of Uganda hampered the delivery of humanitarian aid for displaced persons. Relief agencies operated with caution outside of major towns and often traveled with Ugandan military escorts. Military convoys were often disorganized and slow because of the military's shortage of soldiers, vehicles, and fuel – further retarding relief deliveries.

"Continuous insecurity.hampers humanitarian aid getting to the most vulnerable, including children, orphans, [pregnant] women, ... widows, elderly, disabled, and internally displaced persons in general," the United Nations humanitarian coordination office in Uganda reported.

Poor financial support by international donor nations further weakened relief efforts. "In general, funding was either too late or insufficient," UN agencies stated in November, after receiving only $16 million of the $27 million needed to address emergency needs in the country.

The funding shortfall forced curtailment of programs meant to improve water, sanitation, and counseling services for displaced families. Aid workers reported that inadequate assistance programs pushed some uprooted people "into harm's way" by forcing them to travel to different areas in search of help. Funding constraints also prevented relief organizations from mounting a proper census of displaced people. As a result, the World Food Program and the International Committee of the Red Cross suspended aid to southwest Uganda for a month because of concerns that beneficiary rolls were inflated.

Despite security and financial problems, humanitarian agencies managed to provide large quantities of food aid, provided cooked meals for 150,000 displaced children in the north, and distributed seeds and farming tools to more than 60,000 displaced and drought-affected families. Aid workers established or improved some 700 fish ponds to supplement local diets, and repaired about 75 miles (125 km) of roads to facilitate truck deliveries. Aid workers also provided more than 360 new or renovated classrooms for 65,000 students.

Ugandan Refugees

Some 20,000 Ugandan refugees remained outside the country at the end of 2000. About half of them fled the country many years ago and have remained long-term refugees. The other half have fled back and forth from southwestern Uganda into northeastern Congo-Kinshasa because of ADF rebel attacks.

Refugee repatriation to Uganda has slowed to a trickle in recent years. Ugandan authorities halted most repatriations from Sudan in 1998 because of officials' doubts about the identities of potential returnees. Fewer than 100 refugees formally repatriated during 2000.

General Asylum in Uganda

The 230,000 refugees in Uganda at the end of 2000 were the largest refugee population in the country in several years. At least 7,000 new refugees entered the country during the year.

Uganda has practiced "a liberal refugee policy" for many years, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) stated in 2000. The government has attempted to place many refugees into settlements with access to farm land and has tried to avoid placing refugee populations in crowded camps. Most refugee sites have offered food aid where necessary, as well as primary schools, training in literacy and occupational skills, and small credit programs to encourage business activities. A $3 million UNHCR budget shortfall during the year, however, forced suspension of school construction projects at some settlements.

The government and UNHCR worked jointly during 1999 to prepare a new refugee law that would strengthen the legal rights of refugees in Uganda, and would clarify the government's asylum procedures. Government officials failed to enact the law during 2000, however.

Refugees from Sudan

Large numbers of Sudanese refugees have lived in northern Uganda for years because of civil war in their own country. Refugee movements back and forth across the border have become common, linked to the level of violence in Sudan and rebel activity inside Uganda.

Some 5,000 to 10,000 new Sudanese refugees arrived in northern Uganda during 2000. Few Sudanese repatriated from Uganda during the year.

An overwhelming majority of the 200,000 Sudanese refugees lived in 25 designated settlements in northern Uganda and nearly equaled the local population in some districts. Nearly 90 percent had access to farm land, but fewer than a quarter of the refugees grew enough food to become self-sufficient. Others continued to receive full or partial food rations. Drought and rebel activity hampered agricultural activities and forced aid workers to defer their plans to phase out food aid during the year.

Ugandan officials and UNHCR continued efforts to help Sudanese refugees become economically self-sufficient through a program known as the Self-Reliance Strategy (SRS). The SRS, begun in 1999, attempted to blend refugee assistance with Ugandan social services, and provided improvement projects to local communities hosting refugees. For example, UNHCR offered support to local schools that agreed to enroll Sudanese students. UNHCR funding shortfalls and increased rebel attacks undermined the SRS program, however.

"Security in and around refugee camps and settlements continue to be a source of concern," UNHCR reported. "Border areas ... where most refugee settlements are located are economically marginalized and suffer from occasional incursions and attacks by armed rebel forces."

Ugandan guerrillas have killed more than 115 Sudanese refugees since 1996, including at least five deaths in some 35 raids on refugee sites during 2000. The raids have abducted significant numbers of refugee women and children, including 30 abductions during a single attack in July, according to one report.

Refugees and aid workers have complained over the years that Sudanese rebels periodically entered refugee sites near the border to conscript young men and women and to retrieve deserters from their ranks. UNHCR reported no such incidents in 2000, however.

Refugees from Congo-Kinshasa

Some 10,000 refugees from Congo-Kinshasa (also known as the Democratic Republic of Congo, formerly Zaire) lived at four designated sites, primarily in southern Uganda. About 2,000 new Congolese refugees arrived during the year, as war and ethnic hostilities persisted in their own country.

About 5,000 Congolese refugees resided at sprawling Kyangwali camp, where an attack by ADF Ugandan rebels killed two refugees in September. Government officials increased security patrols near the camp after the attack.

More than 2,000 Congolese lived at Nakivale camp in Mbarara District; about 1,000 resided at the Kyaka II site; fewer than 200 occupied Rhino camp in northern Uganda. About 40 percent of the Congolese refugee population were able to grow or buy enough food to feed themselves, but competition for land produced growing tensions with local residents. UNHCR funded water and sanitation programs, education, health care, and community services at refugee sites.

Refugees from Rwanda

Some 15,000 Rwandan refugees lived in Uganda at the end of 2000, primarily at the Oruchinga, Nakivale, and Kyaka II settlement sites in the country's south.

A majority of the refugees had access to farm land and needed only partial food assistance from humanitarian agencies. Residents of Nakivale site, however, generally lacked agricultural land and required full food relief.

Unlike previous years, UNHCR reported no serious protection problems for Rwandan refugees during 2000.