Last repatriation flight from Kenya to Ethiopia

Briefing notes

Last repatriation flight from Kenya to Ethiopia

This is a summary of what was said by UNHCR spokesperson – to whom quoted text may be attributed – at today's press briefing at the Palais des Nations in Geneva.

27 July 1999

A last flight carrying Ethiopian returnees home from Kenya will take off from Dadaab tomorrow, 28 July, wrapping up a two-week repatriation operation. 1,450 Ethiopians will have returned from Kenya aboard the UNHCR-chartered aircraft which has made 21 sorties since 15 July.

The airlift is the last sizeable repatriation of long-time Ethiopian refugees from Kenya. From a high of nearly 100,000 Ethiopians at the beginning of this decade, Kenya now hosts only 3,000 refugees from that country. Since 1991, the refugee population in Kenya has shrunk dramatically, with 230,000 mainly Somali and Ethiopian refugees going home and the subsequent closure of 13 camps in the north of the country.

Ethiopian refugees who arrived in Kenya before 1991 may now be examined on a case-by-case basis to determine whether they will continue to benefit from refugee status.