Refugees clash with police

The UN refugee agency UNHCR in Namibia has denied press reports that protesting refugees were shot by police in a confrontation over reduced paraffin rations this week. The Namibian newspaper reported refugees as saying that one refugee had been shot and several injured by police on Monday, when they tried to quell a disturbance during the distribution of paraffin by the aid agency Africare on behalf of UNHCR. "This is sensationalist reporting," UNHCR Country Representative Hesdy Radhling told IRIN on Wednesday. "The implementing partner [African Humanitarian Action] running the health clinic said nobody was in hospital because of any police action." The Namibian quoted police spokesman Chief Inspector Angula Amulungu as confirming that 20 refugees had been arrested, but he denied that any had been shot by the police and insisted that only warning shots were fired. Radhling said the disturbance was caused by a small group of refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo, belonging to the Association for the Defence of Refugee Rights (ADRR). He said agreement had earlier been reached with the formal and more representative Osire Refugee Committee to accept the cut in paraffin supplies, forced on UNHCR by budgetary constraints. But the ADRR were opposed to the new ration, which reduced the monthly four-litre allocation per person by half. "On the day of distribution, when the other refugees went to collect their paraffin, they tried to prevent them and created a situation where the police had to intervene. After the intervention by the police the distribution continued," Radhling said. Paraffin is used by the refugees for cooking and lighting. Around 95 percent of the aproximately 20,000 refugees in Osire are Angolan. The ADRR "represents a very small fraction of the refugees in the camp ... [and] it is not the first time they have tried to cause a commotion", Radhling said. Maize meal supplies were also cut this month in Osire, 250 km north of the capital, Windhoek. Refugees only received half-rations last week, but the World Food Programme (WFP) partially compensated for this by increasing the corn-soya blend allocation from 1 kg to 3 kg per person. WFP head in Namibia, Abdirahman Meygag, said the distributed food represented about 1,600 calories per day for each refugee, instead of the target of 2,100. "They didn't welcome the reduction, but when we explained the reason, they understood," he told IRIN. WFP has appealed to the Namibian government for an exemption to a maize import ban - designed to protect local farmers - because it is unable to afford the local price of maize, currently nearly 60 percent higher than the landed cost of South African grain in Windhoek. The government's Agronomic Board is expected to respond to WFP's request on Thursday.