IDP camp at Kanyarucinya north of Goma
Global concerns as DR Congo IDP hits 4million
The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, has said Democratic Republic of Congo now has about 3.9 million internally displaced people in several key regions of the country.
This, the UN body said called for a serious concern as the number has more than doubled since 2015.
“Some 428,000 of these people have been displaced in the past three months” said UNHCR spokesperson Adrian Edwards at a media briefing.
Edwards added that over the past year, some 100,000 Congolese have fled to neighboring countries as refugees.
Today, altogether, there are some 621,711 refugees from the DR Congo in more than 11 African countries and funding is urgently needed, said UNHCR.
“With widespread militia activities, and unrest and violence fueled by ethnic and political conflict affecting many areas, the risk of further displacement in Congo is high,” said Edwards. “The challenges of getting aid to people in need are growing fast.”
In the eastern province of Tanganyika of Congo, where some 584,000 people are internally displaced, intercommunal conflict between the Twa and Luba groups spilled into neighboring Haut-Katanga province earlier this year.
Over 922,000 people were forced to flee their homes in 2016. This was the highest number of internal displacement due to conflict recorded globally, and was one of the most startling findings of the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre’s global report which was launched in New York today.
“DR Congo has largely forgotten crisis in central Africa superseded all other crises in terms of the number of people forced to flee their homes,” said Ulrika Blom, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s Country Director in DRC. “Even Syria or Yemen’s brutal wars did not match the number of new people on the move in DRC last year.”
“Certain countries drop off the international agenda only to re-emerge a few years later with significant numbers of new displacements,” said Alexandra Bilak, Director of the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC). “This was the case for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, which highlights how the failure to address the underlying causes of conflict and crisis results in cyclical patterns of displacement.”
Scores of civilians have been forced to flee, and there have been reports of murders, looting and extortion, and torture or other inhumane treatment. With people finding it difficult to sustain their livelihoods, more are becoming dependent on aid.
Refugees crossing from DR Congo into neighboring Zambia are hosted temporarily at the Kenani transit center, close to the border, where over 5,400 people are currently staying, said UNHCR.
Further north in the east of DR Congo, violence involving mostly local armed groups is plaguing North and South Kivu provinces. In North Kivu alone, over one million people are displaced, while in South Kivu, 545,000 people are internally displaced.
Meanwhile, in the Kasai region in central-southern DR Congo, displaced people and refugees who fled the violence that started over a year ago have begun to return, although 760,000 people remain displaced.
As of Oct. 23, over 710,000 people had gone back, but many are finding their property in ruins and family members killed
Due to the situation in the three DR Congo regions, UNHCR and partners have recently upgraded the situation the country to level 3 — the highest level of emergency.