France commits over €500,000 for Eritrean refugees in Ethiopia

By Tesfa-Alem Tekle

November 27, 2013 (ADDIS ABABA) – The French government and the UN Refugee agency(UNHCR) on Tuesday signed an agreement in which the French committed €550,000 to aid tens of thousands of Eritrean refugees in Ethiopia.

UNHCR’s representative in Addis Ababa, J.O. Moses Okello signed on behalf of the Refugee Agency while the French Ambassador in Ethiopia, Brigitte Collet signed on behalf of France.

“The funds will be spent on protection of vulnerable girls and for care of orphans and child refugees who arrive in Ethiopian camps unaccompanied,” UNHCR Senior Public Information Associate, Kisut Gebreegziabher, told Sudan Tribune.

According to UNHCR, the numbers of unaccompanied minors who are crossing borders to Ethiopia without family have increased in recent months.

Part of the funds, said Gebreegziabher, will also be used to support ongoing programmes such as education and vocational trainings and raising awareness to avert illegal migration of refugees.

A number of Eritrean refugees are reported to have escaped from Ethiopian camps in an attempt to illegally make risky journeys to Arab countries.

Kisut said Eritrean refugees are currently receiving programs that will help them attain skills needed for them to be productive once camp life is over.

Under the Government’s “out-of-camp” policy, hundreds of Eritreans have also joined Universities in Ethiopia.

The funds secured from France will be used to make refugees self-reliant and to increase their incomes on top of the support they get from humanitarian organisations.

Currently there are around 80,000 Eritrean refuges at six camps in Ethiopian’s northern Tigray and Afar region, both bordering Eritrea.

(ST)