Security concerns in Chad
Briefing Notes, 8 May 2009
This is a summary of what was said by UNHCR spokesperson Ron Redmond – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at the press briefing, on 8 May 2009, at the Palais des Nations in Geneva.
UNHCR operations in most of the camps for Darfur refugees in eastern Chad are continuing, but we are concerned by the volatile security situation in the region as several armed confrontations took place earlier this week in refugee areas. Fighting between Chadian troops and anti-government forces took place in the Koukou Angarana area, where 22,000 refugees from Darfur are hosted in Goz Amer camp. Some 60,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) are also scattered in different settlements in that area. New fighting was reported yesterday (Thursday) in the Am Dam area, some 100 kms south of Abéché, the main town in eastern Chad.
On Wednesday, in face of the confusing security situation, UNHCR relocated 18 staff members from Koukou to Goz Beida, about 50 kms away. Two staff remained in Koukou to ensure that basic activities will continue in Goz Amer camp and in the displacement sites. But reduced humanitarian activities can only be sustained for a short while and we are hoping to regain access to the Koukou area very soon. Other aid agencies also relocated their staff out of Koukou as a precautionary security measure.
In eastern Chad, UNHCR and its humanitarian partners are care for 252,000 refugees from Sudan's war-torn Darfur region. They are in 12 camps stretched along the remote Chad-Sudan border. There are also 166,000 internally displaced Chadians in the east. In addition, we are also assisting 70,600 refugees from the Central African Republic in six sites in southern Chad.
The Nubians in Kenya
In the late 1880s, Nubians from Sudan were conscripted into the British army. The authorities induced them to stay in Kenya by granting them homesteads and issuing them British colonial passports. The Nubians named their settlement near Nairobi, Kibra, or "land of forest." In 1917, the British government formally declared the land a permanent settlement of the Nubians. Since independence, Kenyan Nubians have had difficulty getting access to ID cards, employment and higher education and have been limited in their travel. In recent years, a more flexible approach by the authorities has helped ease some of these restric¬tions and most adult Nubians have been confirmed as Kenyan citizens, but children still face problems in acquiring Kenyan citizenship.
The Nubians in Kenya
Southerners on the move before Sudanese vote
Ahead of South Sudan's landmark January 9, 2011 referendum on independence, tens of thousands of southern Sudanese in the North packed their belongings and made the long trek south. UNHCR set up way stations at key points along the route to provide food and shelter to the travellers during their arduous journey. Several reports of rapes and attacks on travellers reinforced the need for these reception centres, where women, children and people living with disabilities can spend the night. UNHCR has made contingency plans in the event of mass displacement after the vote, including the stockpiling of shelter and basic provisions for up to 50,000 people.
Southerners on the move before Sudanese vote
Darfuri Refugees in Chad: No end in Sight
More than six years after the beginning of the conflict in Sudan's Darfur region, more than a quarter-of-a-million refugees remain displaced in neighbouring Chad. Most of the refugees are women and children and many are still traumatized after fleeing across the border after losing almost everything in land and air raids on their villages.
Families saw their villages being burned, their relatives being killed and their livestock being stolen. Women and girls have been victims of rape, abuse and humiliation, and many have been ostracized by their own communities as a result.
The bulk of the refugees live in 12 camps run by UNHCR in the arid reaches of eastern Chad, where natural resources such as water and firewood are scarce. They have been able to resume their lives in relative peace, but all hope one day to return to Darfur, where hundreds of thousands of their compatriots are internally displaced.
In eastern Chad, UNHCR and other agencies are helping to take care of 180,000 internally displaced Chadians, who fled inter-ethnic clashes in 2006-2007. Some families are starting to return to their villages of origin only now.
Darfuri Refugees in Chad: No end in Sight
Sudan: A Perilous Route
Kassala camp in eastern Sudan provides shelter to thousands of refugees from Eritrea. Many of them pass through the hands of ruthless and dangerous smugglers.
Sudan: Heading for a New Home
UNHCR is offering to help move hundreds of people from Sudan to newly independent South Sudan, where they will build new lives. Almost 250 families with ties to the south are waiting for a ride.
South Sudan: Blue Nile Refugees
Refugees are streaming in from Sudan's Blue Nile Region into South Sudan, many to Doro Camp.
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