They endure stigma, discrimination, violence and extreme poverty, but Ugandan women living with disabilities say the greatest challenge facing them centres on their reproductive health. "In addition to the impacts of physical, mental, intellectual and sensor impairments, we are double discriminated (against), first as women, and then as disabled," said Beatrice Guzu, executive secretary of the National Organisation of Women with Disabilities in Uganda.

The World Health Organisation said today it was investigating reports of suspected cases of the previously eradicated disease smallpox in eastern Uganda. Smallpox is an acute contagious disease and was one of the world’s most feared sicknesses until it was officially declared eradicated worldwide in 1979.

Innocent Rokundo, 42, is a Rwandan who has lived in a refugee camp in western Uganda for the past 15 years. He fled his country during the 1994 genocide with his wife. She returned to Rwanda in 1996, but he has had no contact with her since.

The recent US bill aimed at achieving peace in Uganda by militarily eliminating the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is rigorously critiqued by Samar Al-Bulushi. It is a bill, she argues, that will serve to prop up Uganda’s government. Al-Bulushi highlights the questionable origins of the bill: It is a response to the calls of a few US organisations – who coincidently emerged at the same time as AFRICOM – for peace in Uganda rather than the Ugandan people, who advocate non-violent paths to finding peace. She goes on to emphasise the vagueness of the US’s strategy to bring about this peace. And she aptly points out that, in supporting the Ugandan government, the US is buffering a regime that not only has a poor human rights record, but has actively prevented peace in Uganda. Al-Bulushi concludes that ‘Propping up a militaristic regime risks not only exacerbating the conflict, but also deflecting attention away from crucial discussions and demands for internal reform.’

Kate Ofwono recently visited Geneva to join UNHCR events linked to International Women's Day. The 23-year-old refugee from Uganda took part in a panel discussion and presented a film she made about her life in Kakuma camp. She fled to the camp in north-west Kenya four years ago after her father was killed and her mother kidnapped in eastern Uganda.

All Pherebonia Nyiramatabaro, 85, wants is land where she and her 15-year-old grandson can grow a few crops. Nyiramatabaro, living in a two-roomed hut in Juru A camp in the Nakivale Refugee Settlement, southwestern Uganda, is one of thousands of Rwandans hit by a Uganda government directive barring refugees from cultivation

At least two protesters have been shot dead by Ugandan police after they tried to stop the president from visiting the site of a fire at a royal mausoleum. The protesters booed President Yoweri Museveni and set up a barricade to stop him from reaching the tombs at Kasubi.

The Federation of African Journalists (FAJ), the African Regional Organisation of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), strongly criticized the Press and Journalists Bill in Uganda on the grounds that it is unsound and constitutes a major stumbling block to press freedom and democratic standards in the country.

A farming ban imposed on Rwandan refugees in southwestern Uganda is raising concerns for their food security, while proposed cash transfers could boost both food prices and theft, warn aid workers and local officials, who are urging the government to rescind the directive.

The International Rescue Committee (IRC) is building on initial success to reduce child labor in northern Uganda by launching a new program to further tackle the underlying poverty that forces many families to send their children out to work.

Inadequate healthcare is just one of many challenges facing the 16,200 refugees in this sprawling camp in western Uganda, which is served by a single doctor. Among those waiting in one of the camp’s two health centres when IRIN visited was Mirian, 30, whose child was shivering with fever, most likely caused by malaria.

Following the tabling of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill before the Ugandan Parliament that provides for imprisonment and the death penalty for infringements of the bill, civil society organisations in Africa are mobilising to persuade Ugandan parliamentarians to block this pernicious bill. The bill could become law during the course of this year. Organisations and prominent individuals are invited to endorse a statement as part of the campaign to block the bill.

With at least 67,000 refugees in southwest Uganda, the government and aid workers are still battling inadequate resources in what a UN official described as a "silent emergency". "We can hardly meet international standards of indicators such as water, health and food," Nemia Temporal, deputy representative of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Uganda, told IRIN on 8 March. "For instance, we are delivering 15 litres [of water] per person per day instead of the standard 20l."

ARTICLE 19 welcomes the recent bold move by the Uganda Parliament to pass the Whistleblowers Bill, a critical milestone in the country's efforts to stem corruption and embrace transparency and accountability. The Bill, approved by Parliament on 3 March 2010 in Kampala aims to create an enabling environment for citizens to freely disclose information on corrupt or improper conduct, both in the public and private sectors. In enacting the law, Uganda is the third country in Africa to adopt such a comprehensive law.

An online petition containing more than 450,000 signatures has been presented to the Uganda Parliament, urging members to withdraw a proposed bill that, if passed, would broaden the criminalization of homosexuality in the East African country and introduce the death penalty in certain cases.

A study presented at the recent Seventeenth Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections founds that Ugandans presenting at a TB clinic grossly overestimated the likelihood that they had HIV. It also found that those who thought they had HIV were significantly less likely to refer members of their household for HIV testing than those who did not think so.

Uganda’s members of parliament (MPs) are pressurising government to make public details of oil production-sharing agreements it signed with various international oil companies.

Rescue teams in Uganda are still digging into heaps of mud in an effort to rescue survivors of a landslide that has so far killed 88 people while 400 are still missing. Lack of advanced rescue equipment has complicated the rescue efforts. There are no earth movers on site and some residents are digging with their bare hands.

More than 450,000 people have signed an online petition urging Uganda's parliament to drop a bill that would impose the death sentence for the crime of "aggravated homosexuality" - when an HIV-positive person has sex with anyone who is disabled or under the age of 18.

Professor Mahmood Mamdani has been appointed to head Makerere University Institute of Social Research (MISR). This means the renowned scholar will be returning to the university after 17 years. Mamdani's five-year contract takes immediate effect. He will replace Dr. Nakanyike Musisi who left last year when her contract expired after 10 years of service.