Somali refugees repatriated

Somali refugees living in Obock, northern Djibouti, have been repatriated to their homes in Mogadishu and southern Somalia. Those repatriated had “expressed their wish to go back”, UNHCR Programme Officer in Djibouti, Zeidane Ould T’feil told IRIN. The refugees had fled across the Eritrean border when fighting flared up in the Eritrean port of Asab, during the latest round of fighting with Ethiopia. Out of some 1,100 refugees, 502 said they wanted to be repatriated, said the UNHCR official. The repatriated refugees were flown to Somalia from Djibouti with an individual allowance of US $80. Ould T’feil told IRIN that UNHCR would help repatriation of Somali refugees “within the limits of our financial standing, because the repatriation was not a pre-planned operation”. Another 500 refugees are expected to fly back to Somalia with the help of the official Djibouti agency, the office National d’Assistance aux Refugies et Sinistres.