'Keeping people in IDP camps remains an effective military tool for counter-in surgency,' said Nyakayirima, Chief of Uganda People Defence Forces (UPDF), an army that has been engaged in over 20-years insurgency, led by the vicious Lords Resistance Army (LRA) rebels.
He spoke at a press conference here last Thursday.
An estimated two million people were uprooted from their homes and forced to live in sordid camps, dotted in the northern Uganda, where one of the world's dreadful longest insurgencies, characterised by ghastly killings, claimed hundreds of thousands of lives.
Nyakayirima's revelation which serves as a classic example of how IDPs were created, will be one of the agenda items to be tackled at a special African Union (AU) Special Summit on Refugees, Returnees and Internally Displaced People in Africa, at the lake side resort of Munyonyo. But this might be a subject for debate.
Under the theme: "Addressing the Challenge of Forced Displacement in Africa", an estimated 19 heads of state will be aiming to end the causes of forced displacement, strengthen measures to mitigate the impact of displacement on women and children, and fast-track rebuilding of communities emerging from conflicts.
The summit will also honour Uganda's efforts at hosting refugees and displaced peoples and come up with a draft of the AU Convention on IDPs and refugees to be named the Kampala Convention.
While denying knowledge of a policy of counter-insurgency in restive eastern Dem ocratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Central African Republic (CAR) and Somalia, Nyakayirima, who spoke about a decade's experience of commanding 10,000 UPDF troops against hundreds of LRA rebels split in various small groups, insisted IDP camp were a good strategy.
Debate has raged over the efficacy of such camps, with critics likening them to death traps stalked by disease, hunger and overcrowding.
AU Commissioner for Political Affairs, Julia Dolly Joiner, speaking at the start of the Executive Council meeting preceding the AU heads of state summit on Monday, observed that forced displacements and human migrations were neither unique to Africa nor confined to this century.
By the end of 2008, International Displacements Monitoring Centre (IDMC) reported an estimated 11.6 million IDPs in 19 African countries, the lowest internal displacement figure in Africa in a decade but still nearly half of the world's tot al IDP population.
Countries which IDMC monitored included Algeria, Angola, Burundi, Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, Côte dâ?Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda and Zimbabwe.
New displacements were reported in Côte d'Ivoire, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Somalia and Zimbabwe, but the largest were in Kenya with 500,000 new IDPs, DRC with 400,000, Sudan (Darfur) with 315,000 and Somalia with 300,000.
The highest numbers of returns were in DRC and Uganda, both with 400,000, and in South Sudan with 350,000, while returns were also reported in Algeria, CAR, Chad, Côte dâ?Ivoire, Eritrea and Kenya.
Obstacles to durable solutions in the region included insecurity, the lack of basic services and infrastructure in areas of return, limited livelihood opportunities and land and property issues.
Munyonyo - 19/10/2009
Pana
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