The UN refugee agency says it’s extremely concerned about continuing attacks by Sudanese janjaweed militia in eastern Chad. The UNHCR says besides posing a threat to refugees from Darfur, the attacks are triggering displacement of thousands of Chadians. Helene Caux is a spokesperson for the UNHCR. From the southeastern Chadian city of Goz Beida, she spoke to VOA English to Africa Service reporter Joe De Capua about how the janjaweed attacks are affecting Sudanese refugees and Chadians.
“This is certainly an increasing dynamic in eastern Chad. Not only has Chad to deal with (over 200,000) refugees from Darfur, but also has to deal now with 50,000 displaced Chadian people. These people have been displaced following regular attacks from the janjaweed militia. And this is certainly a concern because Chad simply doesn’t have the capacity to handle such a high number of displaced people, including refugees.”
The attacks have been going on for months. “Caux says, “Since the beginning of the year, these attacks have increased. And for the past two or three months, the displaced persons have mentioned to our teams on the ground several massacres, several attacks which resulted in a lot of killings of people. One of the main attacks was against the village of Djwara, which is about 60 kilometers away from the Sudanese border. And over a hundred men were killed during this attack in April, which coincided exactly with the attempted coup against N’djamena.”
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