Forcible repatriations of Tutsi refugees appear to have ceased

Forcible repatriations from Rwanda of Tutsi refugees who fled from northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo in the 1990s to escape ethnic persecution appear to have ceased, Ron Mponda, the deputy representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Rwanda, told IRIN on Friday.

While nothing official had been said by Rwandan authorities, they appeared, since around 14 October, to have desisted from actively encouraging or compelling the refugees to return to the North Kivu region of DRC, he said. Up until then almost 9,500 of the refugees had returned, he added.

Gihembe camp in central Rwanda and Kiziba in Kibuye Prefecture in the west was hosting about 24,000 remaining Congolese refugees, he said, and was now functioning normally except for the fact that schools had not reopened. This meant that about 700 secondary school children and 6,800 primary and nursery school pupils were now one and a half months behind in their schooling.

Local authorities in Rwanda had said they needed to conduct a census of the remaining refugees to establish how many children and teachers remained in the camps, but having done that, had failed to reopen the schools, he said. "No explanation has been given," he added.

In a letter written at the beginning of September to Rwandan President Paul Kagame, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Ruud Lubbers expressed "grave concern" over the apparent forcible repatriation exercise launched on 31 August. He said UNHCR would not associate itself with the operation, which appeared to be "neither voluntary not sustainable".

Mponda told IRIN at the time that UNHCR had not been informed of the exercise, and that there was no legal framework in place - such as a tripartite agreement between the UN, the government of Rwanda and the rebel Rassemblement congolais pour la democratie - to sanction it. He added that the refugees had been misinformed about the conditions to which they were returning.

The Rwandan government has consistently denied the accusations. In a statement released on Wednesday, the government said the repatriations were the result of "the success of the Rwandan Patriotic Army [RPA] in the promotion of inter-ethnic harmony and the pacification of areas of eastern DRC where the RPA was operating".