Refugees to go home after peace agreement only if security is guaranteed, says UNHCR

Sudanese refugees will be prepared to go home after a peace agreement is signed by the government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) only if they "see real security on the ground", a high-level team from the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has heard first-hand. Refugees in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Kenya had "pretty unanimously" said they were keen to return home, Dennis McNamara, UNHCR’s inspector-general, told IRIN in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi. But their first concerns were protection and physical security during and after their return, including from armed groups and militias. Women's concerns included landmines and the large numbers of small arms in communities after 20 years of civil war, UNHCR reported. "We want to go home, but only when we are sure it is really safe on the ground," one of the refugee leaders told the UNHCR team. "We have learnt from 1972 [date of the previous Sudanese peace agreement which fell apart in 1983 with the start of Sudan's second civil war] that peace agreements have to be respected and implemented if we are going to be able to go home permanently." McNamara told IRIN that the UN would neither encourage nor promote returns to any areas deemed unsafe, but that inevitably some refugees would return spontaneously. He said a big question was what the UN peacekeeping role in Sudan would be and whether it would specifically include the security of the returnees. Refugees had also stressed that continued education for their children, as well as other basic services, including health, water and income-generating activities, were important factors in their decision to return, UNHCR reported. Women called for a major initiative to improve literacy and emphasised that they would need temporary shelters once they got a home and help in finding ways to earn a living. Women refugees were particularly concerned over their status as women from "outside", as some of them had married non-Sudanese, McNamara told IRIN. He noted that women were neither involved in the peace talks between the government and the SPLM/A, nor in the SPLM/A's planning for the returnees. "We need to really focus on women's rights," he said. "It's the women who will rebuild the country." UNHCR says 150,000 refugees may go home in the first 18 months after the signing of a peace accord, but stresses that the figure is only an estimate. Initially, small groups of men would probably return spontaneously to vet their home areas, who would then send word to the refugee camps regarding safety and services, said McNamara. He emphasised the need for "active partnership" among UN and other agencies to quickly provide essential services. UNHCR is planning to re-establish its presence in southern Sudan in five locations after an absence of 14 years. Logistics, landmines, engineering and security teams are now in the southern Equatoria region assessing the routes and other infrastructure to be used for any convoys taking refugees home. If ongoing peace talks in Kenya clinch a deal, the return of the refugees could be one of UNHCR’s biggest repatriations this year. It is estimated that the war has uprooted more than 3 million people inside Sudan, while a further 600,000 are living in neighbouring states as refugees. The largest numbers are in Uganda (223,000), followed by Chad (110,000), Ethiopia (88,000) the DRC (69,000) and Kenya (60,000). The current round of peace talks, which was scheduled to have ended on Tuesday, is to continue until at least 22 March. A deadlock has been reached over the status of three "transitional" areas traditionally considered part of the north, but currently controlled partly by the SPLM/A - the Nuba mountains, southern Blue Nile and especially oil-rich Abyei. Meanwhile, the conflict in Darfur continues to escalate with no peace talks and no return for the 110,000 refugees in Chad in sight.