UGANDA: insecure conditions in the "triangle"
All ICRC activities in the so-called “triangle” zone, to the north and north east of Kampala, were sus- pended in July 1984 because of insecure condi- tions. The "triangle", comprising the districts of Luwero, Mpigi and Mubende, is inhabited by a large number of displaced civilians who are victims of the clashes between Ugandan forces and those opposed to the government. Up to July, approxi- mately 100,000 people were being assisted in this conflict zone.
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At the beginning of 1985, however, the ICRC (through the Government relief agency) was still supplying medical and material assistance to displaced people in the three transit camps
Nakasi, Kibisi and Busunju
on the roads to Bombo and Mytiana, and to a hospital in the lat- ter town. For the first time since October 1984, a delegate and a doctor were able to go to Nakasi and Kibisi in March to conduct a survey. After further contacts with the authorities, the delegation in Kampala received per- mission on 4 April to resume part of its work in the "tri- angle"; delegates were at last able to make distributions in two transit camps. Between January and June, the ICRC thus provided 560 tonnes of relief supplies (food and blankets) to the displaced people in Nakasi, Kibisi and Busunju. Medical assistance continued to be concen- trated on the transit camp in Kampala, "Yellow House", where consultations are regularly given by doctors and
nurses.
After the "coup d'Etat".
On 27 July the government of President Obote was over- thrown by a "coup d'Etat". For two days the Ugandan
Aircraft hijacked to Kasese: passengers transferred through the intermediary of the ICRC
On 10 November, a Uganda Airlines aircraft flying between Kampala and Arua was hijacked and forced to land in Kasese in the southwest of the country, Forty-two passengers and five crew members were on board. ICRC delegates based in this town visited them and organized the exchange of Red Cross messages between them and their families living in Kampala and in the province of West Nile. Among the passengers, five German nationals were released on 16 November and reached Kigali, Ruanda, where their embassy took charge of them. While the parties concerned were directly negotiating the release of the other passengers, the ICRC offered its serv- ices to organize their transfer to Kampala. On 17 Decem- ber, at the request of the Ugandan Government and the NRA, a DC-3 was chartered by the ICRC in Nairobi and made two round trips between Kasese and Entebbe air- port to bring the passengers to Kampala. The flights to Kasese carried two tonnes of medicines from the ICRC for nine hospitals in the region, and 3,000 blankets for distribution to the displaced people in the Mbarara region.
Visits to places of detention
In 1985 ICRC delegates visited 7,500 detainees, 1,700 of whom came within its sphere of competence, in prisons and police stations in Kampala and its surrounding area.
On 10 August 1,203 detainees were released from Luzira prison in Kampala. The ICRC gave them relief supplies, blankets, soap, etc. and paid their travel expenses home; twenty-eight of them who were too weak to return home were taken by the ICRC to its reception centre, Yellow House, in the capital. In the areas controlled by the NRA, delegates based in Kasese began visits in Novem- ber to three places of detention, where they saw a total of 339 people; they also visited 209 prisoners at Mubuku prison near Kasese, 67 others at Bihanga and 63 at Kiburara.
capital was the scene of rioting and looting. During this period almost all the food in the depots was stolen and twenty-two vehicles marked with the red cross emblem disappeared (some of the vehicles were recovered later).
The delegation established contacts with the new authori- ties in order to resume its activities. Delegates immedi- ately undertook missions along the Bombo and Hoima roads and in the rest of the country. With the League and the Uganda Red Cross, a mission also went to the north to study the situation of displaced people and examine the possibility of a return to Uganda for refugees living in neighbouring countries.
In September, the insecure conditions prevailing in Uganda again obliged the ICRC to suspend all travel.
In mid-October, after taking further steps to explain the role of the ICRC to the authorities and obtain from them guarantees of access to the "triangle", delegates set out once more by road from Kampala to Bombo.
An office was opened in Kasese, in the region controlled by the National Resistance Army (NRA) and a delegate was based there on 28 October. Initially he was joined by a doctor; a convoy with two other delegates and two UNICEF representatives on board left Kampala by road, via Zaire, and reached Kasese on 2 November. Medicines were flown in from Kampala. The ICRC's aim in Kasese was to assess the needs of the civilian population and to visit prisoners held by the NRA; the regions of Kasese, Fort Portal, Hoima, Mubende, Mytiana and Mpigi were visited in turn.
Support for the Uganda Red Cross
While readjusting its activities because of political and military changes, the ICRC continued its support programmes for the Uganda Red Cross, above all in con- nection with the exchange of family messages and tracing missing persons, but also with the dissemination of humanitarian law.
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