Kenya turns up the heat on Somali refugees
JOHANNESBURG/NAIROBI, 4 June 2014 (IRIN) - As security forces in Kenya
continue to round up and detain thousands of migrants, refugees and asylum
seekers, most of them Somali, an agreement between the UN Refugee Agency
(UNHCR) and the Kenyan and Somali governments on the voluntary repatriation
of Somali refugees is coming under strain.
In late May, the Somali government pulled out of a meeting with UNHCR and
the Kenyan government to formally launch a Tripartite Commission and discuss
implementation of the
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report/99117/briefing-repatriating-somali-refugees-
from-kenya> Tripartite Agreement. The Agreement, signed in November 2013,
outlines the procedures for the gradual and voluntary return of Somali
refugees from Kenya, which is currently hosting around 423,000 Somalis
holding refugee status.
The scheduled 27 May meeting was to be first of the Tripartite Commission
and was expected to produce agreements on a number of joint actions,
including the launch of a pilot phase of a voluntary returns programme that
has been on hold for several months. The cancellation of the meeting stalls
the dialogue on voluntary returns to Somalia where internal security is
currently challenged due to a joint
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?reportID=99817> military offensive
against the al-Shabaab insurgency by the African Union Mission to Somalia
(AMISOM) and the Somali National Armed Forces (SNAF) in south-central
Somalia. Recent estimates point to around 73,000 people being displaced due
to the military offensive, including to some of the areas identified for
voluntary refugee returns as part of the pilot phase.
Explaining its decision not to attend the meeting, Somalia cited "the
detention and deportation of Somali refugees both documented and
undocumented" which it described as contrary to the letter and spirit of
both the 1951 Refugee Convention and "more importantly", the Tripartite
Agreement.
Kenya's Commissioner for Refugee Affairs, Harun Komen, responded that
Somalia's decision not to attend the meeting was "unfortunate".
"We are still committed to the Tripartite Agreement and Mogadishu must show
it is committed as well," he told IRIN. He added that most of those
repatriated would return to the Somali region of Jubaland and that if the
Somali government failed to move the process forward, "we have options
including dealing with the Jubaland administration or doing it with UNHCR."
UNHCR did not comment directly on Somalia's last-minute withdrawal from the
meeting but its representative for Somalia, Alessandra Morelli, noted that
"The way forward is to ensure that there is a strong dialogue and
discussions on all aspects of returns and reintegration in Somalia. The
Tripartite Commission is the most important forum and initiative in place to
ensure that voluntariness will guide refugee returns and that those wishing
to return to Somalia can do so in a safe and dignified manner."
Arrests and deportations
Since Kenya's Interior Ministry launched Operation
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report/99927/ethnic-somalis-under-pressure-in-kenya
n-capital> Usalama Watch in late March, purportedly as an anti-terrorism
operation, more than 4,000 individuals are estimated to have been arrested
and detained, most of them ethnic Somalis living in the Nairobi suburb of
Eastleigh. A further 2,000 refugees have been sent to Dadaab and Kakuma
refugee camps while 359 Somalis have been deported to Somalia by air using
chartered commercial airlines flying from Nairobi to Mogadishu since early
April.
Usalama Watch follows a spate of attacks involving grenades and firearms in
Mombasa and Nairobi in March. Such attacks have continued since the start of
the operation, which came soon after the government announced that all urban
refugees had to move to the remote Kakuma and Dadaab refugee camps, despite
a 2013 high court order prohibiting such a move.
According to Human Rights Watch (HRW), at least three of the recent
deportees were registered refugees while many of the others may have had
genuine claims to asylum but been unable to apply since Kenya stopped
registering urban asylum seekers in December 2012.
Fowzia Hussein Da'ud was among those who had tried and failed to register as
an asylum seeker in Nairobi and as a result was considered undocumented. She
was detained by Kenyan police for 45 days before being deported to Mogadishu
where she spoke to IRIN over the phone. "I am so demoralized that I have
been separated from my two kids who are now in Nairobi with relatives. I
can't stay here in Mogadishu; this is the place where my husband was killed
six years ago," she said, adding that she would like to move to Uganda but
cannot afford to.
HRW has <
http://www.hrw.org/news/2014/05/23/kenya-mass-deportation-somalis>
said that the deportations constitute refoulement, a violation of a key
principle of international refugee law that forbids the forced return of
people to places where they risk persecution or serious harm.
Security concerns trump tough living conditions
Kenya has hosted large numbers of Somali refugees since the collapse of the
Mohamed Siad Barre regime in 1991. Around 35,000 of the current caseload
live in urban areas outside of refugee camps, while an unknown number of
Somalis live in Kenya as undocumented migrants.
Conditions in the Dadaab camps have deteriorated in recent years as
insecurity and dwindling donor funding have severely impacted the ability of
aid agencies to deliver services, and since the Kenyan authorities placed a
moratorium on
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report/95456/kenya-somalia-life-on-the-margins-of-d
adaab> registrations of new refugees in October 2011.
Despite the presence of an internationally supported federal government in
Mogadishu,
there is a broad consensus among aid agencies, including UNCHR, that large
parts of Somalia are too unsafe to receive returnees. At the same time, some
2.9 million people are affected by a
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report/100051/somalia-at-risk-of-relapse>
humanitarian crisis, one that has attracted just a fraction of the US$822
million needed to address it.
And on 2 June, the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization
<
http://www.fao.org/news/story/en/item/232742/icode/> warned that "late
rains and erratic weather patterns in Somalia have raised concerns over a
worsening of the food security situation, as food stocks from the last, poor
harvest become depleted and prices continue to rise sharply."
Somalia's State Minister for Interior and Federalism Affairs Mohamud Moalim
Yahye
<
http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/05/somalia-says-kenyan-refugee-expulsion-will-l
ead-chaos-anarchy/> recently told the IPS news service that "the unplanned
and uncoordinated deportation of people, especially the youth, will create
chaos and anarchy as there are no resources to support and them create jobs
for them."
Through the pilot return programme, which has yet to launch, UNHCR is
planning to provide return assistance for up to 10,000 refugees to three
districts of South Central Somalia - Luuq, Baidoa and Kismayo - to where aid
agencies including UNHCR have access. The
<
http://www.irinnews.org/report/100051/somalia-at-risk-of-relapse> return
package will include a transport allowance and access to food and basic
shelter items as well as assistance starting up livelihoods.
The relatively low numbers of Somalis returning home in the first three
months of the year suggested that for the vast majority of Somali refugees,
difficult conditions in Kenya were not enough to override deteriorating
security in Somalia. Between January and March 2013, at a time when
stability appeared to be returning to several parts of the country, nearly
14,000 Somalis crossed the border from Kenya.
During the same period this year, only 2,725 refugees made the journey,
while less than 3,000 had visited Return Helpdesks in the Dadaab camps,
according to UNHCR. Returns picked up slightly in April, as the crackdown by
Kenyan security forces got underway, with 1,442 Somalis going home. These
cross-border movements are believed to be largely temporary and in
conjunction with rainy seasons and farming activities in south central
Somalia.
Pushed to return?
UNHCR's <
http://www.unhcr.org/publ/PUBL/3bfe68d32.pdf> Voluntary
Repatriation Handbook describes "the principle of voluntariness as the
cornerstone of international protection with respect to the return of
refugees" and stresses that a truly voluntary decision to return should be
made in the context of both conditions in the refugee's home country ('pull'
factors) and conditions in the host country ('push' factors).
"As a general rule," notes the handbook, "UNHCR should be convinced that the
positive pull-factors in the country of origin are an overriding element in
the refugees' decision to return rather than possible push-factors in the
host country."
Article 10 of the <
http://www.unhcr.org/528102b49.html> Tripartite
Agreement also states that the decision of refugees to repatriate to Somalia
"be based on their freely expressed wish". UNHCR's Morelli added that
"external push factors, which may jeopardize the right of the refugees to
make voluntary (and informed) decisions about their returns to Somalia,
should be avoided."
However, several refugees that IRIN spoke to said constant harassment by the
police since Operation Usalama Watch began and the fear of deportation had
forced them to consider returning to Somalia.
"I am moving back to Mogadishu at a time the security situation is still
chaotic, but I have no other option," said Abdirahman Mohamed Jama, 42, who
works at a Somali radio station in Nairobi and has lived in the capital with
his wife and four children since 2008.
"The police have come to our flat a number of times, and after showing them
our refugee documents, they handcuffed me and my wife and threatened to take
us to the police station [unless we paid a bribe]. We paid them several
times, but we cannot afford to continue paying them. We are in shock, fear
and suffer from many sleepless nights," he told IRIN. "I have to leave
Nairobi before I am forcibly expelled to Somalia or separated from the rest
of my family as has happened to many of my Somali neighbours."
Rufus Karanja, a programme officer with the Refugee Consortium of Kenya
argued that "the manner in which operation [Usalama Watch] has been
conducted has created a negative push factor" that was causing some Somalis
to opt to return home rather than endure continued harassment, extortion and
arbitrary arrest.
"In our view, this may actually amount to induced forced return, something
which goes against the spirit and intent of the Tripartite Agreement which
provides that the return of Somali refugees should be voluntary and
conducted in safety and dignity," he told IRIN.
ks/am
Received on Wed Jun 04 2014 - 18:54:38 EDT