Governments agree to open more border crossing points

The governments of Burundi and Tanzania have agreed to try to open more border crossing points to facilitate the voluntary return of Burundian refugees living in western Tanzanian camps, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported on Wednesday. Under the terms of the agreement, signed on Wednesday at the end of a two-day Tripartite Commission meeting in the Burundi capital, Bujumbura, one border crossing point would be activated. The meeting also agreed on the "desirability" of opening more crossing points, notably in Makamba, southern Burundi, as soon as possible. However, the activation of this point would be subjected to security assessment, UNHCR said. The meeting also recommended that three additional border crossing be activated between August and October: the Murusagamba-Gahumo crossing in Cankuzo Province is to be opened by the end of August, while Manyovu-Mugina in Makamba Province and Mabamba-Gisuru in Ruyigi Province are expected to be activated in September and October, respectively. In other proposals, the Tripartite Commission recommended that UNHCR extend aid to refugees travelling on their own to Rutana Commune in southeast Burundi. For its part, UNHCR said it was currently providing basic aid to spontaneous returnees arriving via Gisuru (Ruyigi) and Mugina (Makamba) entry points. With regard to assisted returnees, UNHCR said that along with transportation from the camps to their communes of origins, they were provided with a return package comprising UN World Food Programme food items and non-food items for three months. It added that special assistance for vulnerable returnees, such as the elderly and unaccompanied minors, was also provided. The commission is scheduled to reconvene in November in Kigoma, Tanzania. UNHCR recalled that it began assisting the return of Burundian refugees in March 2002. By the end of 2002, 53,283 had returned home - 31,421 with UNHCR assistance. By the end of July 2003, an estimated 48,000 had returned home voluntarily, bringing to an estimated total 100,000 returnees for the past two years. The meeting of the Tripartite Commission took place as Burundian President Domitien Ndayizeye was in Pretoria, South Africa, holding his first face-to-face talks with Pierre Nkurunziza, leader of the country's biggest rebel group, the Conseil National pour la Defense de la Democratie/Forces pour la defense de la democratie (CNDD-FDD). The talks are aimed at reaching a power-sharing deal ahead of a regional summit scheduled for Sunday in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. "We hope the ongoing peace talks in South Africa will produce a durable peace needed for the restoration of security conditions that will allow UNHCR to assist repatriation throughout Burundi," Stefano Severe, the UNHCR representative in Burundi, said.