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Liberia: CMC Appalled by IDPs, Refugees' Conditions
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The Analyst (Monrovia)
6 February 2008
Posted to the web 7 February 2008
The Faith-based Media Group Christian Media Center says the Liberian Government and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) have abandoned thousands of internally displaced Liberians and Sierra Leonean refugees in camps outside Monrovia.
A release from the Christian Media Center classifies as dehumanizing the condition at the camps for internally displaced Liberians and Sierra Leonean.
The group alleged that conditions at the camps are appalling with a rise in deaths from preventable and curable diseases, especially amongst kids. The group said there are no safed drinking water and medical facilities at the camps which are the major causes of death and sicknesses.
Christian Media Center noted in the press statement that authorities at the UNHCR confirmed ceasing support to the camps on grounds that the commission officially closed the camps in 2004, and have ever since embarked on local integration programs for which the commission cannot provide humanitarian assistance to the refuges.
But the Christian Media Center noted that this position of the UNHCR has made the nearly three thousand Sierra Leonean refugees vulnerable which it considers a gross violation of their rights.
The faith-based media group said in the absence of local integration, the refugees have no status to be gainfully employed to a earn living. Touching on the situation of the IDPs, CMC said the Liberian government's claim that it has ended displacement was challenged by the IDPs.
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According the group, the IDPs said they were issued tickets for resettlement benefits but they never received the items and that in the absence of those resettlement packages, they could not return to their counties of origin.
The CMC noted that government's refusal to provide the support for IDPs in the absence of the receipt of their resettlement packages is a violation of their rights.
The Media Center is calling on the local and international advanced organizations to investigate what it considers grave human rights violations against some internally displaced Liberians and Sierra Leonean refugees.
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