AFRICA/GUINEA - UN High Commission for Refugees closes office in Kissidougou after helping tens of thousands of refugees, many of whom have returned to their own country

Monday, 2 October 2006

Conakry (Agenzia Fides) - The UN High Commission for Refugees has closed its office in Kissidougou, after 18 years of activity in the Republic of Guinea.
“UNHCR decided to close its office and end its presence in the region of Kissidougou mainly because its operation to repatriate Liberian refugees has been successfully completed” a UNHCR statement affirms.
UNHCR opened its office in 1989, initially for a period of 8 years in the town of Guékédou, close to the borders with Sierra Leone and Liberia. In December 1997, it has to move to Kissidougou, 80 km further north for security reasons. At that time thousands of refugees were pouring into Guinea, fleeing civil war in Sierra Leone and Liberia. Between March 2005 and September 2006, UNHCR helped 16,000 Liberians to repatriate out of a total 18,000 present in the region of Kissidougou. The remaining 12,000, unable or unwilling to return home, were moved this month to Kouankan, near Nzérékoré in south east Guinea. With over 41,000 assisted repatriates to Liberia, thanks to UNHCR, Guinea is top of the list of west African countries involved in repatriation operations of Liberians in which over 90,000 people have returned home starting from October 2004. In these period of time in Kissidougou region UNHCR has assisted tens of thousands of Liberian refugees and refugees from Sierra Leone camped in three different localities. Boreah Camp had only citizens from Sierra Leone and it was closed at the end of 2004.
Activity in Kountaya Camp will cease during this week and UNHCR will leave the region. As it closed down UNHCR left the local communities which helped to assist refugees for all these years about 3,600 items including medical supplies, school uniforms, furniture and sewing machines.
The closing of its Kissidougou office will allow UNHCR to rationalise and consolidate financial and human resources in Guinea where there are still about 39,000 refugees including 30,000 Liberians, the rest come from Sierra Leone and Côte d'Ivoire. These remaining refugees are mainly in camps along the borders with Sierra Leone, Liberia and Côte d'Ivoire, although there are also 9,000 in Conakry the capital. (L.M.) (Agenzia Fides 2/10/2006 righe 38 parole 500)


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