The Uganda Human Development Report released yesterday says that Kitgum district has the lowest standard of living, followed by Gulu district - both in the war-affected region. Karamoja region has the highest poverty index at 65.3, while Kampala (the capital) has the lowest poverty index at 9.6. Kitgum also has the lowest life expectancy of 29 years, followed by Gulu at 30 years. Northern Uganda also has the lowest literacy rate at 56%. This highlights the gross regional inequalities that have resulted after two decades of war and displacement in the north. Read more at The New Vision.

Human rights group Amnesty International today accused the Ugandan judicial system of failing to act against the widespread rape and sexual abuse of women in the war-affected northern region. A new report, entitled "Uganda: Double Traumatized," says that women victims of gender-based violence in northern Uganda face "insurmountable difficulties in trying to ensure that perpetrators are brought to justice." These include community stimatization, under-staffed police posts, document fees, a lack of government medical doctors (only 8 in Acholi in Lango) to verify injury, and weak judicial institutions. Amnesty's report further says that government officials and military officers are among those responsible for the abuse. "The utter lack of justice faced by women and girls who are the victims of sexual violence requires the immediate attention of the Ugandan government and the international community," said Godfrey Odongo, Amnesty's researcher in Kampala. "The justice system in northern Uganda ignores, denies, and tacitly condones violence against women and girls and protects suspected perpetrators," the report concludes. Read the full report here.

In this week's Wednesday look at Uganda's neighbors, we focus on the worsening humanitarian crisis in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Reuters AlertNet reports, "Refugee camps are nothing new in DRC where fighting has forced more than 370,000 people from their homes in the eastern North Kivu province this year alone. Now thousands of the capital's 8 million inhabitants are under threat from bad weather after heavy downpours razed hundreds of homes and killed more than 30 people in 24 hours." UN IRIN reports that the "blood keeps on flowing" as government troops and rebels loyal to General Laurent Nkunda continue fighting. A senior UN envoy has called on parties in the country's troubled North Kivu province to avoid any actions that could harm the already beleaguered civilian population.

The latest UN humanitarian reporting from October shows that the complex movements of IDPs to and between original displacement camps, satellite camps and their villages of origin differ highly by region. In Lango, over 95% of IDPs have returned to their homes. However, in Acholi a majority of people remain in the original camps, while less than 5% have returned to their villages. In Teso, over 75% of IDPs remain in camps, most likely due to fear from Karamojong attacks. Tens of thousands of northern Ugandans displaced outside the region also are beginning to return home. Monitoring of population movements has found that many vulnerable persons, such as those with disabilities and school-attending children, are staying behind in IDP camps.

Karamojong cattle raids are also at their highest level of recent months, while clashes between armed Karamojong civilians and the Ugandan soldiers attempting to disarm them continue.

The UN refugee agency and ACTED, an international NGO, have decided to suspend road rehabilitation projects in Amuru district in northern Uganda due to insecurity. 2 national staff of ACTED were killed on November 1st by suspected bandits. Read more at The New Vision.