Six Sudanese kids abducted by French charity to return home
March 22, 2008 (KHARTOUM) – Some 6 Sudanese children will return to the country to reunite with their families after months in an orphanage in Chad near the Sudanese border.
Around 103 children have spent the last five months in an orphanage in Chad, following attempts by a French charity to fly them to France for adoption, saying they were war orphans from Darfur in Sudan.
The Secretary General of the National Council for Childhood Amira Fadil said that six children abducted by the French organization, Arche de Zoé will be returned to Sudan by the Red Cross.
of French and extradite them to their families within Sudan by the end of this month, Red Cross Society
She announced the opening of the Unit for the Protection of Child and Women on March 25 in El Geneina, the capital of West Darfur.
This unit will be run by a mechanism of National Council for Childhood, police, civil society organizations and UNICEF, which provides technical support to the unit.
Amira further said that she will visit the families of the abducted children during a visit to West Darfur.
Chadian and United Nations officials accompanied 83 children from Abeche, where they were housed as international court cases and wrangling over compensation ensued, to Adre, a village near Sudan’s border.
Chadian president Idriss deby said he grant a pardon to the French aid workers. However he insisted that the damages and interest of 6.3 million euros (9.8 million dollars) the court ordered the charity to pay on December 26 mattered as a judicial decision that must be respected.
The case raised tensions between France and Chad, a former French colony, as Paris prepared to spearhead a 3,700-strong EU peacekeeping force in eastern Chad to protect refugee camps in the region bordering Darfur.
(ST)