Uncertainty, rains, undermine refugee repatriation

Uncertainty over Burundi's security situation and rains are undermining the pace of ongoing voluntary repatriation of refugees from camps in western Tanzania, an official of the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, said on Tuesday. "Security concerns, including postponement of elections and the referendum, as well as rains, are among the factors believed to have caused the exercise to slow down," Bulow-Olsen Mia, the UNHCR spokeswoman in Tanzania, told IRIN. She said since the voluntary repatriation began in March 2003, the agency had helped some 153,000 refugees to return home, a majority of whom returned in 2004 when prospects for lasting peace in the central African nation looked bright. "Last year, 80,000 refugees were helped to return home after signalling their desire to go back," she said. "In the middle of the year [2004], up to 11,000 people were leaving in a month, but the figures started going down towards the end of the year." She added, "In October and November, the number of refugees sent to Burundi were hardly above 1,500, and slightly went up reaching above 2,000 in December." Mia said there were fears that the refugees were now reluctant to return home due to political uncertainty, following proposed changes on the constitution and repeated postponement of elections. Others were unwilling to return at this time because it was the beginning of the school year. An estimated 300,000 Burundian refugees live in several camps in western Tanzania, having fled more than a decade of civil war.