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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 June 2000 Issue No. 485 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 June 2000 Issue No. 485
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Sarah El-Deeb visited Eritrean refugee camps in the province of Kassala in eastern Sudan and reports on how regional and international conditions seem to be working in favour of Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir
Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Seeking troubled shelter
The continuing flood of Eritrean refugees is only compounding Sudan's many problems
The scorching sun, hot gusts wind, limited shelter and water did not prevent thousands of Eritreans from slipping across the border into Sudan, their always welcoming, but troubled neighbour to the west. Hawa, or Eve, an Eritrean, gave birth to Adam before crossing into Sudan. Her husband has not seen their first born. "He is fighting somewhere. We left everything behind. Just picked up the money and the donkey cart, and ran from our newly built house. I am going to stay here in the Sudan," she said.
Amina, a member of another extended family that loaded all their belongings on a truck, returned numerous times to the family farm in Tessini, Eritrea, 30 kilometres away from the refugee camp where they now live in eastern Sudan. However, last time she was there, Ethiopian planes bombed the area. Now, she won't go back.
Al-Lafah Camp is the biggest refugee camp in Kassala, a state located along Sudan's eastern border. Most of the Eritreans living in the camp have Sudanese permits and papers. Some were refugees here before. "We have been receiving refugees for 30 years now, since 1967," says the governor of Kassala, Ibrahim Hamid.
Prior to the recent outbreak of war between Eritrea and Ethiopia, Sudan's eastern states of Kassala and Port Sudan were home to 160,000 Eritrean refugees. The UNHCR was scheduled to repatriate them in May after reaching an agreement with Eritrea, only to be met with a new influx of refugees when the conflict resumed. Now, the number of refugees registered by the UNHCR in the five camps in the border villages exceeds the 50,000 that they were initially planned for.
Meanwhile, the unpredictability of the conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia makes anticipating the number of the Eritreans who will flee to Sudan or those who will be displaced within their own country anybody's guess. "Instead of repatriating people, we are trying to care for new arrivals. [This] obviously runs the risk of creating new tensions. These are areas where there may be displaced people already. If they see aid coming in for refugees, they would hope to get some sort of assistance themselves," Paul Stromberg of UNHCR said.
Open borders may be good for smuggling, but in a state of war, they are not making things any easier for Sudan, which was already burdened with three million refugees from other countries including Eritreans as well as having a large population of displaced Sudanese -- victims of the last round of the 17-year-old civil war in southern Sudan.
The problem in the east is not only the refugees. "We have been taking in the Eritreans for the past 36 years and providing them with assistance until they achieved independence [in 1993]. Three years later weapons, ammunition and land mines began to come from the same area we used to help," said the disgruntled governor of Kassala where many villages were bombarded by the Sudanese opposition troops supported by Eritrea.
Sudan and Eritrea had accused each other of harbouring opposition groups bent on undermining the regimes in the two countries. Despite the resumption of diplomatic ties after six years of strained relations, Sudanese newspapers continue to criticise Eritrea. According to Kassala's governor the fact that Eritrea is at war is the only reason Sudan's eastern front is quiet.
With a large contingent of opposition forces, the eastern front continues to be a worry for Khartoum. The military forces of the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), the umbrella opposition group, have been successful in the past few months. In March, NDA forces captured Humeshkorieb, a garrison town and religious centre in the state of Kassala which the army has failed to recapture.
"Now that Eritrea is busy, there have not been any hostile attacks on Sudan; neither big nor small, nor has there been any looting," said governor Hamid.
Sudanese State Minister for Interior Affairs Ahmed Al-Aas, said that members of armed opposition groups had even opted to return to Sudan. "The government has declared an amnesty for the entire opposition. There are so many fronts now working on the so-called reconciliation. So some members of the opposition are coming back to Kassala and other places voluntarily and surrendering to the authorities there," he said.
