A local refugee affairs official in South Sudan’s Ruweng State has criticized a report released by the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Office (OCHA) on the return of Nuba refugees from Yida camp to South Kordofan State.
Last week, the UN agency reported that about 27,500 Sudanese refugees were forced to leave Yida refugee camp in South Sudan’s Ruweng State due to rampant insecurity and shortages of food.
Joseph Thon, Assistant Commissioner for South Sudan’s Commission for Refugee Affairs in Ruweng State, told Radio Tamazuj yesterday that the UN agency’s report is inaccurate.
He claimed that the number of Sudanese refugees who returned to South Kordofan was 806 only.”The number of people who returned to South Kordofan is 806 only from July until this month,” said Thon.
The official further said movements of Sudanese nationals between South Sudan and Yida refugee camp is continuing because many people used to cultivate in the vicinity of the camp near the common border between Sudan and South Sudan.
For his part, Suod Ibrahim Shamela, head of Sudan’s Agency for Relief in the Nuba Mountains also slammed the report on the return of Sudanese refugees to South Kordofan.
“There was exaggeration in the figures, we do not have such a bug number, so is not true,” he said. “What we know in Yida is that the United Nations doesn’t want people to stay in Yida, it wants the refugees to go to Pamir and the refugees refused,” he added.
Shamel claimed that the number of people who returned to the rebel-controlled areas in South Kordofan cannot reach 15 families. He confirmed that there are refugees who returned to al-Atmour and western parts of Kadugli town.