News Service: 11/046/99

AI Index: AFR 59/06/99

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 5 MARCH 1999

MEDIA ADVISORY

PRESS INVITATION

Amnesty International launch of new report on human rights abuses by government forces in Uganda’s northern war zone

KAMPALA -- Journalists are invited to attend the international launch of Amnesty International’s new report on Uganda: Breaking the circle: Protecting human rights in the northern war zone, at a press conference held at the Speke Hotel in Kampala, at 11am local time on 17 March 1999.

The report describes a pattern of killings of unarmed civilians, dozens of rapes and hundreds of beatings by government forces which have been largely obscured by the scale of violence from the armed opposition Lord’s Resistance Army, documented by Amnesty International over the last three years. It highlights weaknesses in the criminal justice system which delay trials of soldiers almost indefinitely. It also outlines the wider dynamic of human rights abuses in northern Uganda, where controlling civilians is a key strategic objective for both the government’s Uganda Peoples’ Defence Forces (UPDF) and the armed opposition LRA.

Chair: Mr Patrice Vahard, Head of Amnesty International’s Africa Regional Office in Kampala

Panel: Mr Maina Kiai, Director of the Africa Program at the Amnesty International’s International Secretariat

Dr Andrew Mawson, Researcher on East Africa

To be confirmed: a Ugandan human rights activist

The panellists will be available for interviews after the press conference as well as on the following day. To arrange an interview, or to receive more information, please call Amnesty International’s Regional Office in Kampala on + 256 41 222951/286232 or, after 11 March, Dr Andrew Mawson on + 256 75 722951.

The Speke Hotel is located at Plot 7/9 Nile Avenue. Contact numbers for the hotel are:

+256 41 259221/259224/235332/5 and speke@swiftuganda.com

Amnesty International works worldwide for the release of prisoners of conscience, fair trials for political prisoners, and an end to torture, extrajudicial executions, “disappearances” and the death penalty.