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The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said it will resume operations in Moba, in Katanga Province, southern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) – a week after a demonstration rocked the town and led to the evacuation of UN staff.
"We had stopped the refugee repatriation movement following the problems in Moba, now we can continue," Love Mtesa, the chairman of the executive committee of UNHCR said on 9 August in the capital Kinshasa, at the end of a weeklong visit to the country.
Mtesa, who is Zambia's ambassador to the UN, said repatriation efforts would continue and the Congolese authorities "have said they are ready to receive them".
On 1 August, demonstrators assaulted and wounded four UN military observers and broke into several offices belonging to UN agencies and non-governmental organisations.
There was looting and stone-throwing as the protesters plundered offices belonging to the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC), UNHCR and several NGOs in Moba, 600km east of Lubumbashi, the provincial capital.
They claimed UNHCR and MONUC were planning to repatriate a group of Congolese Tutsi refugees, known as Banyamulenge, who had fled to neighbouring countries during the war in the 1990s.
Mtesa, who had to cancel his visit to Moba because of the chaos, said the refugee agency was trying to sensitise the local population and Congolese refugees to avoid similar incidents in future. The 1 August demonstration was sparked by incorrect information, he said.
During his visit, Mtesa toured other parts of Katanga, including Lubumbashi. He also held talks in Kinshasa with senior government officials and representatives of the donor community.
"UNHCR and its partners support the Congolese government in the execution of programmes targeting refugees, returnees and the displaced," Mtesa told IRIN.
He said UNHCR had already helped many Congolese people with the reconstruction of homes for returnees, repair of roads and bridges, as well as the construction of schools and other facilities to support the provision of basic services to the public.
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