Humanitarian Situation in the Orientale Province of the DRC Snapshot report, 25 February 2011 A publication of the Humanitarian Information Group (HIG) produced with OCHA’s support The crisis at a glance • Main causes: attacks against civilians by the LRA in the Uele Districts; ongoing conflict in Irumu Territory of Ituri. • Since December 2007, LRA killed 1,989 civilians, abducted 2,642 people, including 915 children. • An estimated 400,000 IDPs are present today in the Orientale Province compared to 60,000 in September 2008. Context Haut-Uele and Bas-Uele districts • Since September 2008, the Ugandan armed opposition group Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has been terrorising the population. It has routinely attacked, looted, and burnt villages and schools, and abducted civilians including children. These attacks have caused widespread panic, leading to a huge number of preventive displacements. • With the agreement of the DRC Government, on 14 December 2008 the Ugandan army launched an air strike against LRA bases in the DRC, leading to the dispersion of the LRA towards the Uele districts, and towards the DRC’s borders with the Central African Republic (CAR) and the Sudan. This has marked the start of the joint military operations between the Congolese, Southern Sudanese and Ugandan armies, which ended officially on 15 March 2009. Almost 5,000 troops of the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (FARDC) are currently deployed in Haut-Uele, to areas considered strategic for the protection of the population. Ituri District • The Ituri District has long been the scene of the Ituri conflict. This was essentially an inter-communal conflict between two groups — the agriculturalist Lendu and the pastoralist Hema — focused on land disputes but had been complicated by the association of communities with political groups taking part in armed hostilities during the First and the Second Congo wars. The conflict was particularly intense between 1999 and 2003, but low- level conflict has continued until 2007 with the end of the third Disarmament, Demobilization and Rehabilitation phase, and its remnants remain today through the presence of armed groups. In the territories of Djugu and Mahagi, land right conflicts continue, creating ethnic tensions between the communities and causing population movements. • In February 2008, a new armed group entered the scene called Front Populaire pour la Justice au Congo (FPJC). The continued presence of armed elements in the district, especially in the southern part of the Irumu Territory, continues to be an obstacle to the return of internally displaced persons (IDPs) who had been displaced during the Ituri conflict. At the end of September 2008, the Forces de Résistance Patriotique de l’Ituri (FRPI) remnants have launched an attack, thereby causing the displacement of more than 100,000 people. • The FARDC, with logistical support from the former United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC), launched several military operations against armed groups during 2009 through an operation called “Iron Stone”. The operation has pushed the armed elements to disseminate into clusters in a wide area, and some observers believe that this has led to an increase in attacks against civilians by such groups. Military operations themselves were a cause for the displacement of an estimated 35,000 people in 2010. • Nevertheless, FARDC managed in March 2010 to open a humanitarian corridor to allow more than 3,000 civilians to go out of the Mokato Ngazi forest in South Irumu before the launching of a military operation against the militiamen in the forest. The IDPs have received an assistance from NGOs and UN agencies. • The south of Irumu finds itself in a chronic situation of instability due to the presence of militia and military operations which cause continued population movements. The continued insecurity in the zone does not allow the displaced to regain their zones of origin. Protection concerns • Available information indicates that, since December 2007, the LRA killed 1,989 civilians, and abducted 2,642 people, including 915 children. In addition, a significant but unknown number of civilians were mutilated, especially as regards their ears and lips. • In addition to human rights abuses committed by the LRA, several humanitarian sources also indicate that the FARDC are responsible for some human rights abuses against civilians in the Uele districts and in the Ituri District (especially in South Irumu), such as extortion of food and other goods, and forced labour. The same misbehaviour is reported against the Mbororos, a pastoralist tribe who came from CAR to DRC in 2005. • The problem of children associated with armed forces and groups (CAAFG) remains an issue of high concern. According to the NGO COOPI, more than 1,330 children kidnapped by the LRA since 2008 have escaped and are receiving support and assistance by humanitarian organizations. • Access to beneficiaries is difficult due to the increase in attacks against commercial vehicles that carry humanitarian supplies and petrol, especially on the Faradje-Dungu axis which has been rehabilitated by MONUSCO in 2010. Population movements • The terror spread by the LRA continues to cause population displacements in the two Uele districts. As of 31 December 2010, the total number of IDPs in the Oriental province is estimated at 400,000, of whom 267,000 in the two Uele districts, 5,000 in Tshopo and 128,000 in the Ituri District. Many of the IDPs are still on the move and are displaced more than once. • In addition, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), approximately 20,000 persons from the province have sought refuge in Southern Sudan and almost 3,500 in the Central African Republic (CAR) and are currently in those countries. • On the positive side, approximately 85,500 returnees in the Uele have been registered between July 2009 and December 2010, mostly in the Faradje, Dungu, Watsa, Bondo and Ango Territories. Should the security situation improve further, the process of return could accelerate. • Despite these ongoing military operations, however, the overall security has improved in the Ituri District over the past few years. This has enabled more than 2,300,000 persons displaced during the Ituri conflict to return to their villages of origin since 2003, including 84,600 who have returned during the last 18 months. • UNHCR and its partners are protecting and assisting around 1,000 refugees who fled LRA’s atrocities from Central African Republic, and constructed a refugee camp in Kpala Kpala in Bondo Territory (Bas Uele District). Access to beneficiaries Haut-Uele and Bas-Uele districts • Access to the affected populations, most notably outside of Dungu, remains very difficult. This is due to poor security conditions in many areas with high concentrations of IDPs, especially due to the activities of the LRA, but it is also due to the minimal road infrastructure in this very remote region. Despite the emergency rehabilitation of few roads by INGO, MONUSCO and IOM, Humanitarian organizations are still dependent on air transport in the remote areas, with subsequently high operational costs. • In April 2009, United Nations entities have established a joint office in Dungu, protected by MONUSCO, and more than 20 international NGOs with 5 UN agencies are implementing programmes in collaboration with local NGOs in areas outside of Dungu. This compares favourably to September 2008, when only two humanitarian organizations were based in Dungu: Lutheran World Federation and OCHA since 2007. • However, due to the improvement of the security situation in Dingila in the Bas-Uele District, some international NGOs, including ACF, MEDAIR, Médecins sans Frontières, Première Urgence and Solidarités International, are now implementing humanitarian projects in the area. UN agencies and NGO partners are now expanding their operations in the Ango Territory (Bas-Uele District). 2 other humanitarian hubs are located in Niangara with 3 INGOs (ACF, MSF, Oxfam-GB) and Faradje with 4 INGOs (AAA, COOPI, DRC, Samaritan’s Purse). Ituri District • Out of 128,000 IDPs in the district, approximately 15,500 (12%) are not accessible especially in Irumu Territory especially in the southern part of Irumu Territory which is still a military operational zone. Access is heavily dependent on improved security, which needs to be guaranteed by the FARDC with the support of MONUSCO. • Première Urgence is working on the Watsa-Faradje road (76 km out of 84 km of the road are rehabilitated), German Agro Action (AAA) has already rehabilitated the 66 km of the road from the Sudanese border southwards to Aba and Faradje, International Organization for Migration (IOM) has already rehabilitated the 193 km of the road between Doruma and Dungu and is working on the 95 km of the road between Dungu northwards to the Sudanese border, and MONUSCO on the road between Dungu and Faradje (more than 100 out of 145 km of the road are rehabilitated). Humanitarian needs and response • Despite insecurity and physical access constraints, United Nations agencies and NGOs are able to provide humanitarian assistance based on the vulnerability criteria to approximately 75% of the IDP population in the province. • In the first half of 2009, several attacks were reported against beneficiaries after humanitarian distributions in Haut-Uele. This emerging tendency was of utmost concern, and had prompted the humanitarian