BURUNDI: Refugee camps in Tanzania to close

From left: Col Didace Nzikoruriho, the coordinator of the government office for the protection of refugees, Bo Schack, the UNHCR representative to Burundi and UNHCR public information officer Andreas Kirchhof at the news conference in Bujumbura on 7 May

BUJUMBURA, 8 May 2009 (IRIN) - The last camp for Burundians in western Tanzania will be closed after the repatriation of at least 50,000 refugees in June, the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said.

"With this repatriation and reintegration, a new page will be turned for Burundi; this will certainly boost its development," Bo Schack, the UNHCR representative in Burundi, told a news conference in the capital, Bujumbura.

The number included 25,000 people who fled Burundi in 1972.

The decision to close the camps was agreed by a tripartite commission comprising officials from Burundi, Tanzania and UNHCR, Schack explained on 7 May.

With regard to fears that the returnees would struggle to access education, health services and, especially, land, he said the government and its development partners were preparing for these challenges.

"We have a better understanding of the context and situation; there is a strong political will," Schack said.

Burundi was also preparing to repatriate 5,000 refugees from the Great Lakes region, including 2,000 in Rwanda. A tripartite commission had met in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, and decided to start the operation in mid-May.

Returnees at a transit camp: UNHCR is due to close the last camp for Burundians in western Tanzania in June

Congolese refugees

The UNHCR official also announced that a new camp for Congolese refugees would be opened in Burundi's eastern province of Ruyigi, with a capacity of 8,400. Burundi hosts 27,000 Congolese refugees - 18,000 of them in camps located in Gasorwe in northeastern Muyinga province;

Songore in northern Ngozi province and Mwaro, in the central Mwaro province. All these camps are already full. Another 9,000 Congolese refugees live in Bujumbura suburbs.

A technical committee comprising UNHCR, Burundian and Congolese officials, met in Bujumbura in August 2008 to work out an accord that would allow the voluntary repatriation of Congolese refugees.

The coordinator of the office for the protection of refugees in Burundi's home affairs ministry said his country welcomed Congolese asylum-seekers. Col Didace Nzikoruriho said 150 Congolese who were given the status of refugees would be transferred to the new camp in Ruyigi in May.

Nzikoruriho also said Burundi had updated its laws to comply with international conventions. Asylum-seekers were now informed, as soon as they arrived, of the procedures to request asylum. They also had the right to appeal if the request is rejected.

Schack said the rate of repatriation to Burundi had increased after UNHCR started giving returnees incentives. "Those who have volunteered to return before mid-May will get 50,000 Burundi Francs [US$41]," Schack said.

In 2008, the agency repatriated 95,000 refugees. It resumed the return of the 1972 refugees on 22 April, after suspending the activity in December 2008 in order to build temporary shelters for the returnees.

Msomaji

Bujumbura