Refugees and troops flee into Sudan

Thousands of Eritrean refugees from the fighting around the Eritrean town of Barentu have been crossing the border into Sudan’s Kassala state. According to Sudanese press reports, the new influx amounted to tens of thousands of people, including civilians and troops. Some 50,000 had crossed into Kassala near Luffah by late Thursday, the official ‘Al Anbaa’ newspaper reported. Security forces were disarming Eritrean soldiers and special camps were being set up for the fleeing military, local reports said.

The UNHCR put the figure of new arrivals at between 6,000 and 20,000, but said there were reports of up to 80,000 more waiting to cross the border. UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said the agency was well placed to deal with the emergency as it already had camps along the border housing some 160,000 Eritrean refugees, some of whom had been there for the past 25 years. The Eritrean authorities estimated the total number of Eritreans displaced by the fighting over the last few days at 1.5 million.