Ahead of visit, exiled group calls for help for refugees

An exiled Mauritanian opposition group is calling on the country's transitional military government to settle the plight of thousands of black Mauritanians exiled for years in Senegal, ahead of an official visit by the junta leader to Dakar. A breakaway wing of the African Liberation Forces of Mauritania(FLAM) - a group fighting for the rights of black Mauritanians - on Thursday called on the junta to take on the dilemma of the 25,000-plus refugees - something military leader Colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall has said should be left to an elected government. "An exceptional problem such as this can be resolved only by a government of exception," Souleye Oumar Ba, spokesperson for 'FLAM-Renovation' (Reform), told reporters in the Senegalese capital Dakar on Thursday. "Vall's transition will utterly fail if it does not tackle this question [of the refugees], because if it tries to focus its entire programme solely on elections it will end up suppressing fundamental problems." Ba said he is hopeful that Vall's meeting with Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade scheduled for 6 March will move things forward. "We think that with President Wade, [Vall] will get the necessary advice and our conviction is that the Senegalese president will help his Mauritanian colleague open his eyes to the problem of the deportees." Wade, however, recently said that the refugee problem was not one to be resolved during a transition. An estimated 65,000 black Mauritanians fled south to Senegal and Mali between 1989 and 1991 to escape ethnic violence that also hit Mauritanians living in Senegal. Hundreds died on both sides of the border. But while some of the black Mauritanians have returned home, some 25,000 remain in Senegal. When the Military Council for Justice and Democracy (CMJD) took power in a bloodless coup in August 2005, some had hoped the new atmosphere of openness and an invitation to political exiles to return would mean the refugees too would be able to go home. But the junta has said it would leave the question of the refugees' repatriation to an elected government. While junta leaders have said those still in exile in Senegal would be welcomed home, refugee and rights groups want the Mauritanian and Senegalese governments to organise a return under the auspices of the UN and international organisations. FLAM-Renovation's Ba said while the Vall government remains reluctant to tackle the refugee question, it has shown itself to be more sensitive to their plight than the past leadership. "The CMJD is reluctant, granted, to take on certain problems, but it recognises better their existence and that is a huge step forward." "There is a new climate, marked by freedom of expression, in Mauritania," he added. FLAM-Renovation branched off from the main exiled opposition group last month, deciding to rejoin the political process in Mauritania. The junta has promised to hand over power to a civilian government, pledging presidential elections in March 2007. In Mauritania, which straddles Arab North Africa and black West Africa, relations are delicate between the country's blacks and its light-skinned Arab population, which has dominated political life since independence in 1960. Sadikh Niasse of the pan-African human rights group RADDHO on Thursday joined the appeal to Wade and Vall, "in order that all these groups can return to Mauritania and participate in the political dialogue that is taking shape."