Thousands newly displaced

Efforts were underway on Wednesday to assist up to 10,000 people displaced by an attack last week on villages in southeastern Chad, while the whereabouts of three aid workers were still unknown.

One worker with Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) was killed and three others wounded in the attack last week on the town of Koloy and surrounding villages. Initially, MSF said 37 of its workers were missing.

“Three are missing. We don’t know about them for the time being but we hope to get some more news soon,” Filipe Ribeiro, head of mission in Chad for Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), told IRIN on Wednesday.

MSF traveled to Ade, about 35 km northwest of Koloy, on Monday and Wednesday. It found up to 10,000 displaced people had arrived there in the past week, although it was unclear how many came from Koloy.

The aid agency said residents of other villages near Koloy, including Faradjani, Marmadengue and Kerwajb, which were also burned by the attackers, fled along with those from Koloy.

Ribeiro said the displaced at Ade had water and were able to go to nearby fields for food.

“Still we have to evaluate the situation. There is no big emergency regarding food but it might happen in the near future,” he said. Sanitation, adequate shelter and medical facilities were lacking, he said.

“We decided to ... help to support the [government] health centre with a team of nurses and one doctor,” Ribeiro said. He said the team would try to provide assistance the thousands of displaced as well as to the local population.

Ribeiro said the clinic at Ade was treating three civilians wounded during last week’s attack. He said it was unclear how many others might have been killed or wounded.

“When we opened the programme in Koloy it was because some people were displaced” and needed assistance, Ribeiro said. "People are moving and moving and moving and pushed out of the places where they are trying to settle.”

Meanwhile, around the area of Goz Beida, about 100 km southwest of Koloy, relief workers say they are preparing to relocate some 5,000 displaced people.

“We are trying to move them in the coming days to a new site,” Helene Caux, a spokesperson for the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR), told IRIN on Wednesday. “They are spread around everywhere around Goz Beida town.”

She said the latest attack in the region occurred three days ago.

“The security situation is still extremely volatile,” Caux said. “People who have been displaced by the recent attacks are still not able to go back to their villages or what is left of their villages.”

UNHCR says armed men on horseback have attacked 23 villages in southeastern Chad since the beginning of November, and people have fled at least 20 other villages in fear of more attacks. At least 200 people have been killed and dozens others wounded. Some have had their eyes gouged out, while others have been burned after being trapped when their homes were set on fire.

Some 75,000 Chadians have been forced to flee their villages in the past year - 12,000 of them this month alone, according to UNHCR.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour warned on Monday that violence is increasingly spilling over the border from Sudan’s Darfur region.

“I am deeply concerned that the horrendous violence that has been wracking Darfur is affecting Chad,” Arbour said in a statement. “Action must be taken immediately to stop a full-blown human rights crisis in southeastern Chad.”

In addition to the spillover from Darfur, Chad is fighting an internal rebellion while inter-communal clashes have also escalated.

Cs/dh