UNHCR expands relocation plans along Chad-Sudan border

ABECHE, Chad, March 25 (UNHCR) - The UN refugee agency has opened the first camp for Sudanese refugees in the southern part of the affected border zone in Chad, offering refugees encamped along the 300-km stretch between Ade and Tissi the first opportunity to move to a safer location further inside Chad.

The new camp, called Goz Amer 1, received the first convoy of 78 refugees on Tuesday and the second convoy of 130 on Thursday. The refugees had been living in makeshift shelters in the border town of Mouraye, south of Ade.

The new arrivals at Goz Amer 1 were received and registered by staff from the Chadian governmental agency CNAR (Commission Nationale d'Accueil et de Réinsertion des Réfugiés) and UNHCR's non-governmental organisation partner, Intersos. The German agency, THW (Technisches Hilfswerk), is in charge of camp management and water supply at the site. A second camp in the same area, Goz Amer 2, is also planned.

Four camps are already operating in the northern part of the region, receiving refugees transferred from around the towns of Tine, Birak and Adré on the Chad-Sudan border.

Daily convoys bring refugees to Farchana camp, which currently hosts 3,630 refugees. Kounoungo camp has received 3,873 refugees so far, while Iridimi camp, which opened last weekend, shelters 1,399. The fourth camp in the north, at Touloum, is at full capacity for the time being with 5,804 refugees. Refugees arriving on foot on their own at Touloum are being taken to Iridimi camp until additional water supplies can be made available at Touloum.

In all, some 110,000 Sudanese refugees are estimated to have fled to Chad from fighting in the Darfur region of western Sudan. UNHCR is mounting a major logistical operation to establish camps and transfer refugees away from the border zone, where they have been subject to attacks by armed militia crossing over from Sudan.