UN to assist resettlement of thousands displaced by ethnic fighting

UN agencies, peacekeeping troops and local authorities in Duekoue, 350 km northwest of the main city Abidjan, are to help 2,700 displaced return to their villages after they fled a spate of ethnic killings in western Cote d’Ivoire four months ago. Boubacar Diallo, head of the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in the nearby town of Guiglo told IRIN on Monday that UN agencies and peacekeeping troops are preparing a voluntary relocation programme, but not all of the displaced are ready to go home. “There are about 1,500 people who are willing to return, and we are meeting today to discuss how we can help them,” Diallo. “As for the [1,200] others, we want to provide food packages and see what we can do for them. It will be a coordinated plan agreed to by everyone involved, including representatives of the displaced.” Ethnic revenge killings in Duekoue and surrounding villages in late May and early June forced an estimated 15,000 people, mainly from the Guere ethnic group, to seek refuge at the Catholic mission. Though most have returned home voluntarily, some 2,700 remain at the mission and resources to look after them are running low. The mission’s priests told IRIN by telephone that they supported plans to resettle their visitors. “We were happy to give them shelter but the time has come for them to go back to their villages,” Father Cisco said. “There is a lack of food and medicine and the activities at the mission are hampered because there are still so many people on our grounds.” Cisco said that despite regular visits and promises of aid by representatives of some UN agencies, the mission fathers had had to bear the brunt of providing food and medication to the displaced during the past months. There was a brief outcry last week when the remaining 2,700 villagers were told they would be forcibly removed from the mission grounds by 1 October in an official letter distributed by the deputy head of the region, which is under military authority. Jan Egeland, under-secretary-general of OCHA, swiftly condemned the order as a violation of people’s rights to seek protection. “The United Nations is deeply troubled by this flagrant lack of respect for humanitarian principles and for the people under our humanitarian protection,” said in a statement issued on the 30 September. But the priests at the mission do not have the resources to host their guests any longer. “If the UN doesn’t want them to return, why doesn’t the UN take its responsibilities and set up a refugee camp?” said Cisco. “Really, the only thing necessary is that villagers of different ethnic groups in this region talk with each other, that there is a dialogue of peace and reconciliation.”