UN SPECIAL ENVOY FOR SUDAN RECOMMENDS RELOCATION OF DARFUR REFUGEES

FARTHER INLAND FROM CHADIAN BORDER, SPEED-UP OF FOOD DISTRIBUTION

NEW YORK, 12 January (OCHA) -- Tom Eric Vraalsen, the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for Humanitarian Affairs for the Sudan, advised moving Sudanese refugees in Chad farther from the border and speeding up the distribution of aid.  Mr. Vraalsen made these recommendations after getting a first-hand look at the conditions in which the refugees live and meeting with officials from the Chadian Government and United Nations relief agencies at Abeche, some 100 kilometres from Chad’s border with the Sudan.

Raids by armed janjaweed militia from the Sudan across a 600-kilometre stretch of remote, insecure borderland between Chad and the Sudan frontier victimize refugees and local inhabitants alike.  The militiamen loot cattle and other livestock, the key source of food and economic activity in the area.  The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has, therefore, begun a programme to relocate the roughly 95,000 refugees to an area some 50 to 70 kilometres farther from the border.  However, not all the refugee sites have been identified yet, because refugees are scattered, sometimes in small numbers, in areas that are difficult to reach.

Compounding the difficulties of the refugees are the remoteness of the region and weather conditions, which could make the delivery of aid to the region almost impossible when the rainy season begins in June.  In this context, Mr. Vraalsen has recommended that delivery of relief items to refugees near the border be expedited, and that supplies be pre-positioned in the areas to which the refugees will be relocated.  Mr. Vraalsen has asked humanitarian agencies in Chad to deliver supplies to people in need as soon as possible and to quickly disburse funds for ensuring supplies are available in rainy season.

UNHCR staff in eastern Chad are preparing to relocate the refugees and has 2,000 tents in the area.  The Chadian Committee for Refugees will play a central role in the refugee registration, to be done in parallel with the relocation.  The first of the new inland camps should be ready to begin accepting an initial population of up to 9,000 refugees in about 10 days.  The UNHCR is working with the non-governmental organizations to dig wells and build latrines and showers, and to handle water treatment.  The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has shipped in 22,000 blankets.  The World Food Programme (WFP) is bolstering its presence in the area.  Aid supplies had been provided to 13,250 of the most vulnerable refugees, many of them women and children.

The majority of the Sudanese refugees near Abeche have entered Chad since fighting in Darfur intensified in July 2003.  In December alone, 30,000 new refugees from Darfur arrived in Chad.  The first groups of refugees tended to bring livestock and other assets with them, but the more recent refugees have been arriving with next to nothing.  Refugee settlements are scattered throughout the region.  The local community and Chadian authorities have been assisting the refugees, but their resources are being strained.  Refugees arriving in Chad continue to report bombing and burnings of villages, killing of civilians, rape, and looting by armed militia.

After the recent talks on peace in Darfur failed to renew a ceasefire between the Government of the Sudan and the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA), fighting continues to rage in western Sudan, causing massive displacement.  One million of Darfur’s 6 million people are directly affected by the conflict.

For further information, please call:  Stephanie Bunker, OCHA, New York, at (917) 367-5126, mobile (917) 892-1679; or Elizabeth Byrs, OCHA, Geneva, at 41 22 917 2653, mobile 41(0) 79 472 4570.

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