Ethiopia Overtakes Kenya in hosting the Most Refugees in Africa
By Staff Writer
Ethiopia has overtaken Kenya in hosting the most refugees in Africa, sheltering 629,718 refugees as of the end of July as Kenya, currently hosts 575,334 registered refugees and asylum-seekers, the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) announced on Tuesday August 20 in Geneva, Switzerland.
Adrian Edwards, spokesperson for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), in Geneva cited the conflict in South Sudan, which erupted in mid-December last year and has sent 188,000 refugees into Ethiopia since the beginning of 2014, as the main factor.
According to UNHCR, 247,000 South Sudanese refugees in the country, making them the largest refugee population. They are followed by Somalis (245,000) and Eritreans (99,000). Over the last seven months, nearly 15,000 Eritreans and more than 3,000 Somalis also arrived in Ethiopia.
"Together with the Ethiopian government and other partners, we are providing protection and humanitarian aid in 23 refugee camps and five transit sites around the country," said Edwards.
Three of the camps and three transit sites in Ethiopia are new, having been opened since the beginning of the year to handle the influx of refugees fleeing the fighting in Juba. All three camps have alrady reached their capacity and the UNHCR is developing two more.
While refugees wait to be moved to the new camps, more than 18,000 are sheltered in three temporary sites in Pagak, Pamdong and Matar in Gambella Region in western Ethiopia.
However, in recent weeks heavy rain has flooded these three low-lying sites, as well as Leitchuor Camp, where the situation is most serious. Some 10,000 refugees, more than a fifth of Leitchuor's population of 47,600, have been hit by flooding.
Many tents and shelters are underwater and latrines have collapsed.
This is a serious health concern and threatens to undermine gains made in preventing the outbreak of water-borne diseases. Refugees have pitched tents on higher camp roads.
"We are working with our partners to drain the accumulated rainwater into a nearby small stream as quickly as possible. We are also speeding up development of the new Nip Nip camp-some three kilometers from Leitchuor. It will be able to accommodate 20,000 refugees," said Edwards
Most of the Gambella region is at a low elevation and flood-prone.
UNHCR continues to work with the government at the federal and regional level to identify additional sites that are less susceptible to flooding.
South Sudan's crisis has caused massive displacement internally and into neighbouring countries. As of mid-August, 1.9 million South Sudanese had been forcibly displaced, of whom almost 1.3 million are internally displaced and more than 575,000 were refugees in neighbouring countries.
With about 25,000 refugees arriving every month in Ethiopia, Edwards further stressed that most are vulnerable children. To that end, UNHCR is girding up its loins to tackle Hepatitis E, which have spread across South Sudan in the last few years and have appeared in camps in Ethiopia.
South Sudan is also continuing to host some 243,000 refugees, the majority from Sudan.
In mid-December 2013, conflict sprang from a political impasse between President Salva Kiir and former Vice President Riek Machar, leaving an estimated 1.5 million people uprooted and on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe.