The senior United Nations Special Rep. for Children and Armed Conflict today said that children in northern Uganda remain at grave risk because of abuses by the LRA. Radhika Coomaraswamy stressed that the rebel group still remains the largest threat to children in Uganda, with at least 25,000 children known to have been recruited during their 20-year campaign of terror in the region. In addition, she said that the humanitarian outlook for demobilized children remained bleak. Those children had only been re-integrated into camps, where life was terrible, and not into general society. There was a need for a more "holistic development vision" to allow them to have other livelihoods and to prevent them from slipping back into military activities, she said. Read more at The UN News Service.

Radhika Coomaraswamy, the new special representative of the United Nations Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, recently visited northern Uganda to assess the situation of children. UN IRIN News interviewed her at the end of her visit. Read excerpts from the interview at AllAfrica.com.

The Uganda government must help to account for thousands of "lost and largely forgotten" children who have been abducted by the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) during the 20-year conflict in northern Uganda, Save the Children has said. "Every day is another day when children are at risk of abduction. Another day of lost education. Another day a child risks contracting malaria. Another day a child can be exploited. And every day, more children are born into these dire circumstances. Enough is enough," said Jasmine Whitbread, chief executive of Save the Children UK, who visited northern Uganda this week. The Save the Children delegation also suggested the Uganda government appoint an ombudsman for children, who would act as their main defender. It also urged the UN Secretary-General to appoint a special envoy for northern Uganda. Read more at UN IRIN News.

According to UNICEF May 2006 reporting, the recent declining trend in "night commuter" figures has reversed as numbers increased during the month of May. In May, the numbers increased by 13.67%, from 5,884 in April to 6,817 children. This is attributed to both insecurity in the region and school holidays.

Despite improved security in northern Uganda, fear and deprivation continue to plague children in the region, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) announced in a report on Friday. According to Unicef's latest report on the humanitarian crisis in Uganda, better security had allowed some displaced families to move from large camps to smaller settlements closer to their homes, and some 30,000 people in Lira District to return to their villages. However, the 20-year insurgency by the rebel Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) still deprives the local population - mostly children and women - of "their rights to access basic healthcare, safe water, education, protection and shelter," the report said. Read more at Reuters AlertNet.