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CRISIS WORSENS 8th March, 2003 "This is the worst humanitarian crisis since the fighting began in northern Uganda more than 15 years ago," said Ken Noah Davies, WFP's Country Director in Uganda. "We had expected things to improve in 2002, but instead the numbers of displaced people has continued to increase, and the displaced people have lost both of the last two harvests due to insecurity ". Funding shortages forced WFP to suspend its distribution of cereals to displaced person's camps in January, and heavy military escort is needed to deliver food to camps in outlying areas. WFP needs some 47,000 metric tons of food commodities from February to July 2003 to address local needs. Northern Uganda's humanitarian crisis is worse than ever. Terrorised by rebels and haunted by hunger, nearly one million IDPs are crammed into 60 impoverished IDP camps.
"People are living like animals. They don't have
a life - they simply exist. If we stop providing food, they will die"
says Charles Uma, chairman of Gulu District Disaster Management Committee. Some 70 percent of the local population in the three districts is estimated to have been displaced as a result of the ongoing insecurity. Thousands of people have lost their homes and belongings. Crops across the region have been destroyed and the majority of the August harvest was lost. Many of the victims were already displaced people or refugees, living in absolute poverty in Adjumani, Gulu, Kitgum and Pader districts. Most communities were unable to plant in September because of fears of being abducted or killed, leaving hundreds of thousands of people dependent on food aid for the foreseeable future. World Food
Program Report Even
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Fighting
in Northern Uganda, has left a million people in need of food aid. But
the only remaining aid agency, the World Food Program is unable to meet
the requirements of almost 3/4 million of these people. 
The
number of displaced people needing food aid in the region has risen
from 520,000 to 800,000 since last July, when the Ugandan government
launched a fresh offensive - Operation Iron Fist - to root out rebel
Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) bases.