Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Conakry (Fides Service)- Southern Guinea is living a silent humanitarian emergency as it sees the arrival of hundreds of thousands of Guinean and foreign refugees forced to leave Ivory Coast shaken by a serious political crisis since 2002.
In June, in south east Guinea, humanitarian operations undertaken by the UN High Commission for Refugees and the World Food Programme were endangered by ethnic clashes at Nzerekore, some 850 km south east of the capital Conakry. Refugee camps in this area receive tens of thousands of refugees from nearby Liberia and Ivory Coast. Also operating in this area are Liberian members of rebel group LURD (Liberian United for Reconciliation and Democracy), one of the main guerrilla movements in Liberia, which in the recent past found support and protection in Guinea. Some of these LURD fighters, still well armed, joined the ethnic clashes between the Malinke and the Guerze.
The situation became worse when more than 100,000 Guinean emigrants recently returned from Ivory Coast. These returning emigrants have no assistance and non Guinean refugees even less, although the World Food Programme has started an aid programme. The region’s resources are exhausted and the block on border trade with Ivory Coast dealt a hard blow on the local economy. What is more the zone is badly connected with the rest of the country. In 2003, the only road to Conakry was blocked for 6 months in the rainy seasons and this caused food prices to increase even 120 per cent.
The only NGO is this area is the Jesuit Refugee Service JRS. According to the local JRS director Gonzalo Sánchez-Terán, “The dramatic crisis in Guinea’s economy is having a devastating impact on the living conditions of returnees in border villages in southern Guinea”. For the past 3 years JRS has distributed food, built homes and run healthcare and schooling programmes. With the local Church JRS plans to open a centre of education for unmarried mothers, and a cereal bank to improve the management ability of the farmers. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 9/7/2004 righe 35 parole 411)
