Nairobi, 10 Feb 2014 (SDN) –About 100,000 Somalia refugees have voluntarily returned home since the East African nation inked a tripartite agreement in 2013, a senior Kenyan government official said on Monday.
Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Lenku told journalists in Nairobi that the UN refugee agency is assisting Kenya in fast tracking the safe return of Somalia refugees back to their country.
“We are encouraging the Somali refugees to voluntarily go back, so that they take part in the infrastructural and institutional reforms in their country,” Lenku said during the First High level African Union Roundtable discussions on durable solutions for displaced persons and refugees.
The one day meeting brought participants from the African Union, UN and Kenya government to develop long term solutions to the forced displacement in Africa.
Before the signing of the tripartite agreement, Kenya was hosting over 650,000 refugees in camps and another 100,000 in urban centers.
The remarks come after UNHCR, Kenya and Somali governments on Nov. 10 last year signed an agreement laying out the framework by which Somali refugees in Kenya could return to their homeland.
Under the agreement, there will be no vetting process, the UN refugee agency confirmed, other than to check the nationality of the person.
A Tripartite Commission will be established, per the agreement, to oversee the implementation of its provisions.
Lenku said that Kenya is among African countries that have endured the greatest burden of hosting refugees.
“However, the African Union has a role to play in the repatriation of the Somali refugees,” he said.
Lenku said that Kenya has paid a heavy price in the form of insecurity, environmental degradation and community conflicts as a result of hosting a large number of refugees.
“Once the repatriation is over, it will give Kenya an opportunity to restore and preserve the environment as well as enhance security,” he said.
He noted that the closing of the refugees camps will help free donor resources for development in Somalia.
The government official added that decades after independence, the African continent is still faced with diverse conflicts and disasters that displace people and slow the pace for development.
“An increasing number of refugees fleeing these countries have become a huge burden to host countries and this call for long term and durable solutions,” he said.
The cabinet secretary urged the continent to take concrete steps to promote stability that will create conducive conditions for the return of victims of forced displacement.
African Union Commissioner for Political Affairs Dr Aisha Abdullah said that the continent is facing unprecedented humanitarian crises.
“The conflicts in South Sudan, Central Africa Republic and the eastern Democratic Republic Congo as well as the drought in the Sahel are causing dire humanitarian situations,” she said.
Abdullah said that the continent has currently over three million refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs).
“Unfortunately, we are experiencing an increase as the number of political conflicts is on the rise,” Abdullah said.
“Recognizing the impact of these humanitarian situations on the overall peace and stability of the continent, the AU is therefore embarking on a reinvigorated strategy to engage with member States in finding lasting solutions,” she said.
Abdullah added that the AU will contribute to the emergence of a political environment within African countries that will be conducive to bringing about sustainable development.
“The solution is to ensure we provide good governance so that political conflicts don’t disintegrate into civil wars,” Abdullah said.
AU Sub-committee on Refugees, IDPs, and Returnees Chairperson Manuel Goncalves said that Africa’s displacement crisis is largely a protracted one.
“These situations do not only pose rights challenges, but also developmental ones for the hosting nations.
“Over the past year, new emergencies have unfolded while old ones have persisted,” Goncalves said.
He said that the vast majority of IDPs and refugees find themselves in long-standing situations.
Goncalves, who is also the Mozambique Ambassador to the AU, said that the continent is faced with an urgent task of ending protracted displacement across the region.
He said that rising trend of food and energy insecurity, water scarcity, climate change, population growth are all exacerbating conflict.
“Durable solutions require approaches which are comprehensive and innovative enough to overcome divisions between emergency assistance and development interventions,” the envoy said.
Source: Xinhua
